Well, let's take our Bibles in turn, if you would please, to Psalm 12. Psalm 12, and we're going to read two verses here. We've been dealing with the doctrine of the Bible. We've been saying that the doctrine of the Bible is the foundational doctrine. In other words, every other doctrine is built on the doctrine of the Bible. If we don't have the words of God today, how can you know anything? How can you know that you're saved? And so we have to have the words of God today, and we've been dealing with, we dealt with the first word, we dealt with revelation. The word revelation simply means this, that God is revealing to us, and we talked about the different ways God has revealed Himself to us. We talked about general revelation, which is God has revealed Himself in general way to every man. through creation and through conscience. So we dealt with that, but then we dealt with specific revelation or special revelation which deals with the Word of God. God has specifically revealed Himself to man in a more specific way through His Word. And through His Word, we can know how we can be saved, how we can be redeemed and all these things. And then we dealt with the word inspiration. So revelation, then inspiration is simply this. It means God breathed. That's what it means. And God, we talked about the doctrine of inspiration, that God breathed out His Word. The words that we have come from God Himself. They're not the words of man. Although there are versions out there in Bibles that have been corrupt that we would say are the words of men or the thoughts of men, the words of God have been inspired. God gave it to us. through an instrument. Man, we talked about how the people were just like an instrument. As you blow into a trumpet, for example, to produce a sound, the human penman was the instrument. God was the one that played the instrument to write His words down. So we talked about revelation, inspiration. Last week we dealt with a little bit of illumination, which means that God is teaching the Christian the truths of His Word. We talked about how we have the Holy Spirit within us that is our teacher. He will guide us into all truth. Now this morning we're dealing with this doctrine, the doctrine of preservation. Psalm 12, verse 6 and 7. The Word of God says here, notice, the words of the Lord are pure words. As silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times, thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever. Now, it's very important because a lot of times people, and you'll see a few statement people today say that the Bible doesn't say anything about preservation. But it does. Some people will do some hermeneutical gymnastics with this verse. Well, the them is not talking about the words, it's talking about the people in the previous verse. But the antecedent to them in verse 7 is the words in verse 6. Notice, the words of the Lord are pure words, as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O Lord. Thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever. Now Revelation is this, let me give you a kind of a little definition about preservation and then we'll go on and talk about it, but the act, the preservation is the act of keeping or saving from injury or destruction. To defend from evil, to save from decay, to keep in a sound state, to keep and defend from corruption. So when we talk about Bible preservation, that's what we're speaking of. That the Word of God has been perfectly preserved for us until this day. Perfectly. Okay? God has done that. Now, let me give you a few of the positions or attitudes out there about this doctrine of preservation. In the book, One Bible Only?, which is a book that you might be familiar with, that was written by fundamentalists, the authors make an interesting statement. They say this, the authors of this book do not wish to discourage anyone from using the King James Version. The Texas Receptus or the Ben Chaim Hebrew text, Christians who are most comfortable with these authorities will find no controversy with us. In fact, we do not completely agree among ourselves in these matters. What we do agree on is this. The King James is not the only true Bible in the English language. In the following pages we will assert that the critical Greek text and the New American Standard Bible, for example, are in fact the Word of God. When King James Only advocates make the rejection of certain Bible texts or versions or a test of orthodoxy, they have gone too far. Their position on these matters ought to be opposed for the sake of the Bible itself. The errors of their view need to be exposed for the sake of souls who are being misled by them. Therein lies the burden of this book. So they wrote a whole book, get this, to thwart people's confidence in the Word of God. I just don't see how you can help people by doing that. Saying, well, we don't really have the words, we don't know, we don't even agree among ourselves. We kind of are still trying to find out. The blind are leading the blind, it seems like. W. Edward Glennie made this claim in an article that appeared in the Bible Version Debate, The Perspective of Central Baptist Theological Seminary. The article was entitled this, The Preservation of Scripture, and he said this, The doctrine of the preservation of Scripture was first included in a church creed in 1647. As we have argued above, it is not a doctrine that is explicitly taught in the Scriptures. Nor is it the belief that God has perfectly and miraculously preserved every word of the original autographs in one manuscript or text type. It is a belief that God has providentially preserved His Word in and through all the extent manuscripts, versions, and other copies of Scripture. Not only does no verse in Scripture explain how God will preserve His Word, But there is no statement in Scripture from which one can establish the doctrine of the preservation of the text of Scripture. It is also obvious from the evidence of history that God has not miraculously and perfectly preserved His Word in any one manuscript or group of manuscripts, or in all the manuscripts. Do you see here what the position says? You see all the versions we have out there? That is all, that's the Word of God. In other words, you can't just narrow it down to one verse, that's the Word of God. You have to take everything. Well, let me ask you this. What if they contradict? Can they both be the Word of God? They can't. They cannot. But that's the position out there on preservation. Some people say, well, the Bible doesn't talk about preservation. Hogwash. That's not true. The Bible deals with the subject of preservation. Now let me explain to you two words that they use here. There's the word autographa, which means, speaks of the original writings. In other words, the ones that God breathed out. We refer to those as the autographa. In other words, that's the word that God breathed. You know that we don't have those today. They're not existent. But God did not promise to preserve paper and ink. He promised to preserve His words. So there's the word autographa, which is the original, but then there's the word apographa, which speaks of the copies. The copies of the original. And these copies have been copied through the centuries, and God has promised to preserve these words, and it's been done through the copies of the original. In other words, some people say, well, the word of God is inspired, but it's not preserved. It doesn't make sense whatsoever. Because we don't have the, if you speak of the definition of inspiration, we don't have the copy in our hand that God breathed out. Nobody does. So God has used the miraculous mode of preservation through the centuries to preserve His Word to every generation. We just read the verse that talks about preservation. Now, the Old Testament, and we're going to deal more specifically. Let me give you a little bit of kind of a background before we deal with preservation. Next, we're going to talk about translation and things like that. This is very important because there's a lot of debate going on about that, and God's not the author of confusion. He's not. This ought to be settled. Now, the Old Testament, and I'm talking about the original writings, were written in Hebrew and Aramaic. This is known as the traditional Masoretic text. This is the underlying text for the King James Bible. In other words, think about the Masoretic text of the Old Testament, which is in Hebrew and Aramaic, is what was used to translate the Old Testament that we have today in the King James Bible. Only. was used. Okay? Now, every other version, including the new King James, today has used other texts than the Masoretic text of the Hebrew and Aramaic. Okay? So that's important. We'll talk about that more next week. Now the New Testament was in Koine Greek. This is known as the Received Text or you may also know it as the Textus Receptus. This is the underlying text of the King James Bible in the New Testament. So think about it here. God has promised to preserve His Word Okay, and he's done that in a copy, okay, of the original, the copies, copy after copy after copy since the time that God breathed out his words has been preserved for us today, wherewith we use the King James Bible to translate from these preserved texts. Now think about it, all these other versions that we hear about today are translated from not these two texts that we mentioned. not the Masoretic text from the Old Testament, and not the Greek text from the New Testament. In other words, they'll use other texts that they found. Now, we're going to talk about that next week, so you come back next week. But we have to ask ourselves this question. How do we know that we have the same words today that were breathed out about 1,900 years ago? How do we know that? It's very simple. God promised to preserve it. That's it. God promised to preserve it. So this is a faith issue. That's important. You know, a lot of times, be careful, because a lot of times people say, well, the scholars have said, the scholars have said, well, that may sound great and all and warm and fuzzy, but the Christian life is a life of faith. I don't trust in a scholar, per se, because they all don't agree. So which one do you trust? But I trust God. And what God said, what did God say? He said He'd preserve His word. His words are pure words. He inspired His word. In other words, if we deal with the doctrine of inspiration, the doctrine of preservation is common sense. You can't have one without the other. They go together. So this is a faith issue. Do I believe, we have to settle this, do I believe what God said? That's it. Let me ask you, do you believe what God said about salvation? That if you repent of your sin, trust Jesus Christ as your savior, believe that he died and pay for all your sins and you trust him by faith. Do you believe that? Okay. It was by faith. Inspiration or inspiration is a faith issue. Preservation is a faith issue. Do we believe God or not? Now, we do not have the originals today. Let me make that clear. The ones that were breathed out, okay? God, as I said, did not promise to preserve the ink and the paper, but He promised to preserve His words. So the question today is, where are the words of God today? One of the first questions I had at Ordination Council was this, where are the words of God today? We have to answer that, because if you don't know where the words of God today, how do you know you're saved? How do you know anything about doctrine or anything? So, if we don't know where the words of God are today, how do we know anything else of Bible doctrine? That's why the doctrine of the Bible is a foundational doctrine for all other doctrine. We're going to deal with three things this morning very quickly. First of all, we're going to look at the assurance of preservation. Some people say the Bible doesn't talk about preservation. Well, let's see what the Bible says. All right? Now, we just read Psalm 12, 6, and 7 where the words of the Lord are pure words, a silver trident, a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O Lord. Thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever. But we also read, I think it was two weeks ago, 1 Peter 1.23. Would you turn there with me, please? 1 Peter 1.23, and we'll read verse 23 through 25. All right, 1 Peter 1.23 through 25. Jack, could you read those verses, please? Okay, so notice, the word of the Lord endureth forever. Now, I think there's a verse that says that faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Matthew 24, 35 says this, heaven and earth shall pass away, but Jesus said, but my words shall not pass away. This was quoted exactly word for word in Mark 13, 31 and Luke 21, 31. That's what Jesus said. Okay? That my words shall not pass away. I think that's Bible preservation. I mean, we could go on and on and talk about verse after verse that talks about how the word of the Lord endures forever. Remember, the word of God is settled in heaven. Okay, so God is going to preserve His Word. Now, as we dealt with here Psalm 12, 6, and 7, I want us to answer really three questions here that I think are important and foundational. First of all, we see the who of preservation. Who is going to preserve the Word? Well, it's God. The Bible says in verse 7, Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, Thou shalt preserve them from this generation and forever. In other words, let me say this, an attack on preservation is an attack on the character of God. If the Word of God is not preserved, then God is a liar. That's what you have to conclude. Because it is God that said that He would preserve His Word. Now, that's very important because today, you know, we talk about God, we preach the Bible, don't we? Well, if we don't know that we have the preserved words of God, how can we preach with authority? How can we with confidence take someone through the Word and say, this is what God said? That's why when you try to talk to someone and have the opportunity to witness to them, what do you do? You don't give them a speech and you don't give them your idea, you point them to the Bible, look, this is what the Bible says, you show them the verse, and look, this is what God says, why? Because it has authority. because it's the words of God. God says, thou shalt preserve them, O Lord. Thou shalt keep them from this generation forever. That's the hul preparation, God. Now people, they try to look at history and look, well, look at these scholars and these people did this and these people did, well, stop, stop. What did God say? What did God say? God said he would preserve it. So we must have it today. So the hul preservation, then we see the what? of preservation. What is preserved? Well, the Bible says, notice again, Psalm 12, 6, the words, plural, of the Lord are pure words. As silver tried in the furnace of earth, purified seven times, thou shalt keep them. What's the them? Words. Not word. Words. Every single word. Therefore, we not only believe, remember we talked about these words, the verbal plenary inspiration of the Bible. So therefore, we believe in the verbal plenary preservation of the Word of God. That means every word, every verse, all of it has been preserved for this generation and forever. So notice we have the who preservation, God preserved it, the what, every word, the words, and we see the how long of preservation. Well, the Bible says from this generation and forever. Now, I know the King James Bible is hard to understand. That's a joke. All right. What does forever mean? It means forever. That means with no end. There's never going to come a time in any generation in this world that the generation is not going to have the words of God. Now, what good is inspiration without preservation? What good is it? A lot of times people say, well, the word of God is inspired, but they'll never talk about preservation. Why? Inspiration is believed, preservation must logically follow. If God miraculously breathed out His Word, yes, indeed, He did miraculously preserve His Word. Why would God breathe out His Words and then leave it to man to say, all right, you all figure it out and you all try to handle it? No, no, no. God said He'd take care of it. You know, Matthew 4.4, it is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by what? every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Let me ask you this. Would God require us to live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God if we did not have every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God? The answer is no. Now here are some examples of the precise and explicit manner in which the Bible states the doctrine of preservation. Now there's, and we could spend a lot of time, but we won't for the sake of time, but there's a lot of verses, a lot of verses on the preservation of the Word of God. So we have the assurance of preservation. The Bible declares it, it's clear, teaches Bible preservation. Number two, we have the affirmation of preservation. When you study the Word of God, what did men in the Word of God believe about the Word of God and about Bible preservation? Well, think about the psalmist for a moment. Psalm 119, verse 89. The psalmist wrote, Psalm 119 verse 152, Concerning thy testimonies I have known of old that thou hast founded them forever. Psalm 119 verse 160, The word is true from the beginning and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth forever. In other words, the Word of God was settled in the eternal plan of God. When God gave the Scriptures, He intended to guard and preserve them. Why? Because they are founded forever. God's people have always had a confidence in the divine preservation of Scripture. In other words, the psalmist says, I have known of old. This was true historically until the rise of the modern biblical criticism controversy, which came out of Germany. And people started to begin to say, wow, look at that, we found some old manuscript in a cave down there, and there's verses missing, but they're older, so they must be better. They were in the trash can, that's where they were. We'll talk about that next week. But we find the psalmist, affirmed Bible preservation. The prophets affirmed Bible preservation. Isaiah 48 says this, The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the word of God shall stand forever. Flowers are intricate and beautiful, but they soon fade away. Not so with the word of God. While it is more intricate and beautiful than any flower, it does not wither or fade. It stands forever. So the psalmist affirmed it, the prophets affirmed it, Jesus Christ affirmed it. When Christ comes on the scene, let me say this, He did not have the original writings, the ones that were breathed out. He has, but He had the perfect copies of the original writings. Matthew 8 17 he says this think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets I am not come to destroy But to fulfill for verily I say unto you till heaven and earth pass one jot or one Tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled Jesus Christ. That's what he said about the copies He says one jot until that means it almost comparable to us as a comma and a dot on the eye not one of those would pass away. That's the affirmation from Jesus Christ on the words of God. Jesus had absolute confidence in the preservation of God's inspired words. Jesus made a constant reference to the scriptures. Remember, he constantly says, as it is written. What was he referring to? to the Scriptures, saying, look, why would He continually quote and say, look, this is the authority. That's why when He told His disciples when they weren't believing the resurrection, He says, how slow of heart and heart of heart do you believe all that the Scriptures have said and all that the prophets have written. In other words, He places the authority on the words of God. And that we must have the same confidence today on the words of God. I can't stand someone getting up out there and trying to say preach the Bible and they belittle the Bible. And say well this shouldn't say this, this should say this. Well this translation over here says this and this version says this. Hogwash with that. We have the words of God today and it's a faith issue. And if we don't have confidence like Jesus did, then we ought not to be calling ourselves followers of Christ. if we constantly criticize the words of God. So we see the psalmist affirms it, the prophets affirmed it, Jesus Christ affirmed it, the apostle Paul affirmed it. 2 Timothy 3.15, he says, remember he wrote to Timothy, he says, and then from the child thou hast known the what? Holy. Holy scriptures. They're holy. That's what the apostle Paul said about the scriptures. The copies that were made of the original were holy. Now the word holy means perfect, without error, without blemish, without any mistake. Paul understood the doctrine of preservation. So we have the assurance of preservation, we have the affirmation of preservation, and lastly we have the assessment of preservation. You know, as we look to what the Bible says about the doctrine of preservation, we understand that we cannot include all modern versions in this preservation discussion. When I say that God preserved His Word, I am not speaking of all the English versions. That is not the preserved Word of God. When words are changed versus missing, doctrine affected, they cannot be true. We do not need scholars to tell us where the words of God are today. We can have absolute confidence that we have the very words of God today because God said. The following are some examples that will help us as we grow confidence in the Word of God. Think about some of the omissions today. In Mark 16, verse 9 and 20, if you turn there in your Bibles, do you know that little section there, verses 9 through 20? is missing in many of the versions today. The entire ending of the Gospel of Mark is omitted or questioned in the modern versions. For example, the NIV separates Mark 16, 9 and 20 from the rest of the chapter with a note that says this, Think about how ridiculous that is. You have a Bible, and then they put in a comma, verses 9 through 20, and say, well, that wasn't in there in the original. Wow, that helps me in my confidence in God's Word. I mean, if I go to that church, I'm thinking, oh wow, I'm really trusting the Bible now, because that's the words of God. I probably wouldn't think that way. Think about Acts 8.37. The entire verse for 37 is omitted or even questioned in the modern versions. And the omission creates a doctrinal change in the passage. In verse 36, the Ethiopian eunuch asks, See, here is water. What doth hinder me to be baptized? Well, that's an important doctrinal issue here. Philip's critical reply in verse 37 is omitted in the modern text. This is one of the most important New Testament passages on the doctrine of baptism. It shows that baptism must follow faith. That baptism is not a part of one's salvation, but follows after as a testimony of a person's salvation. So think about, there's a mission, then there's more. These are two examples. Think about word changes. Now this is a really, it may seem like nothing on the surface, but turn to 1 John 4.2. 1 John 4.2. The Bible says here that, well somebody read the verse here. Give someone an opportunity here. 1 John 4.2. Ray, you got it? Go ahead. Okay. You see here, it says Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. That's an important word. Do you know that the RSV, the NASV, the NIV, the New King James, the CSV all say this? Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. So what's the big deal? Is and has. Let me say this, the Greek word translated is come, in the King James Version, is Elulotha, which is a perfect participle and means that the word not only has been made flesh, but is still flesh. He came in flesh, He is now in the flesh, and will forever be in the flesh. His incarnation will have no end. That's what that is means. Now to translate the Greek word has come has serious theological implication especially in the context of John's epistle which was written to refute Christological heresies that were tempting the churches even in their day. Heretics then and now teach that Jesus is no longer a man or is no longer in the flesh. Many modernists claim that Jesus did not rise bodily, but only spiritually. That while He was in the flesh, He is no longer so. A proper translation of 1 John 4-2 destroys these heresies. Whereas, a mistranslation found in the modern version leaves room for them. Think about it, the deity of Christ is affected. In other versions, the virgin birth of Christ is affected. The blood atonement of Christ is affected today. That's why you hear people teaching different things. And you start hearing some things as other people, John MacArthur, saying, well, it's not the literal blood of Christ that saves us. Yes, without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. It is the literal blood of Christ. without the shedding of blood. So as we think about these things, where does that come from? It comes from small words like this, all throughout the Word of God that have been changed. God has preserved His words today, and it is not in all the versions that we have. And we'll see that next week, it is only in one version that we have today for English-speaking people, and that's the King James Bible. And we're going to see that. The preservation of the Word of God is a Bible doctrine. And let me stop this because we could, I mean, we could go on and on and talk about all, but let me stop and say this. We could argue with people, but this is a faith issue. It's a faith issue. Do I believe God? Do I believe the Word of God is settled? Do I believe it's going to be kept for every generation? Why? I believe God. It's a faith issue. You know, many people today argue, well, Bible reservation is not taught in the Bible, or they belittle it, and say, kind of, you know, you have to find it today. That's why you have to, you know, deal with all these other versions, and you really need to, you know, you really have to have a degree, and you have to have a degree in the Hebrew and the Greek. Look, I took Greek, and I took these classes, and it's a faith issue. Now, I believe the facts are on our side, I do. If you study history, study the preservation of God's word that's in accordance with what God says, yes, the facts are on our side. But let me stop and say this, it's a faith issue. Do we believe the words of God or do we doubt and say, well, you know, let's try to make sense of that. Can you make sense of the parting of the Red Sea? Can you make sense that the God of heaven would become a man without ceasing to be God and die for our sins? No, it's all faith. And Bible preservation is a faith issue. So let's ask, this is a strengthening thing because the attack today are on the words of God. And as I pointed earlier, it's been like that since the beginning. What is the devil trying to do today? He's trying to confuse people. He's trying to make people doubt his word. That's how he started in Genesis. If you attack the credibility of God, then what do you have to stand on? Well, why are people so wicked today? Because they don't believe that God's spoken to them. Why would the world look at a church and say, well, you know, that's where I want to go, while they're confused themselves on where the words of God's are? God's not the author on confusion. We can settle this issue and it's a faith issue. Okay? Thou shall preserve them, O Lord. Thou shall keep them from this generation forever. At First State Baptist Church, we believe in the miraculous preservation of the Word of God.