Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Good morning.
[00:00:07] My name is Eric Bolling. I'm part of the teaching team here. And I didn't get to participate in the, you know, best thing about spring here is mine. It is not winter. Okay. I don't know if you've got a place in your life where like, it's the best you. Right. But summer is the best me. Like, that's when I'm, you know, I don't. No, we don't need to talk more about that. But just. That's how I would answer it. Conspiracy theories.
[00:00:42] Do you guys like conspiracy theories?
[00:00:46] I mean, I'll be honest with you. I like them maybe more than I should admit. Truthfully, I can find myself doing some deep dives into them. Here's an example. I had a friend that was flying to California, had a layover at the Denver airport. And there's all kinds of conspiracy theories about the Denver airport. And at this point you'd like me to go into them all, but I'm not going to because we have to get to God's word. But let me just tell you, there's a lot going on there.
[00:01:18] And so when we look at conspiracy theories, we say, here's why I think they hook us, really, because there's just enough truth in it to maybe be plausible. There's just enough to go. Maybe there's something here, right? And so here, we had an example on Monday.
[00:01:39] I'll show the picture. I don't know if you guys experienced this. If you missed it.
[00:01:44] Yeah, good. Yeah. If you missed it, good luck. Because it doesn't come around again till 2099. But the eclipse. Right, the eclipse. There was a lot going on via the Internet about conspiracy theories related to the eclipse. I don't know if you saw any of those. This was one. Some of you know, I'm a high school teacher, and so I was talking with my students about the eclipse, and one of my students said, you know, Mister Bolling, the eclipse is going over a town called rapture.
[00:02:19] And he just kind of let it hang there and let me kind of fill in the gaps and go, oh, yeah, I'm pretty sure that that's not what it means. There was that one, there was another one with like the last eclipse that came through, made one direction and this one made another making a cross.
[00:02:38] You may have seen that there was one more because it was April 8. Four eight. There's a scripture that talks about the people will not believe me, so I will send them another sign.
[00:02:50] Again, biblical prophecy is true. We can trust it. We can believe it. However, sometimes we can go a little far with our interpretations, although I will say this not to lead us down to a conspiracy theory, but the Bible does talk about the end times, the sun being darkened. So there you go. You can discuss that at lunch today.
[00:03:14] So what happens with prophecies is we tend to take them and we subject them to our own interpretations, right? Especially things written a long time ago, hundreds of years ago, thousands of years ago, we read them. And because we don't have the context that we have in our current reality, we tend to read things into them that may not be in the original meaning or may not be in the original text. And so validity and truth can sometimes be hard to find.
[00:03:47] And so the question we want to ask today is, how do we make sense of what is valid and what is true? Like, how do we look at what's going on around us and how do we say, all right, this is valid, this is true, this is trustworthy, this is not trustworthy. Today we're going to be in two Peter, chapter one, verses 16 to 21. And Peter is going to address this idea of prophecy, and he's going to address this idea of interpreting it in a way that is true and valid, and he's going to use his experience at the transfiguration of Jesus to set this up. And so if you want to turn with me, go to second Peter, chapter one, verses 16 to 21. While we're getting there, just a little context and background. This is written to churches that Peter has helped found and helped establish. They're going through significant challenges, both from Rome and internal challenges from false teaching. Peter himself is about ready to die.
[00:04:51] And so he's writing overall to address false teachings in the church. And one of these interesting false teachings that he is addressing is called gnosticism. And Michael preached on this a couple of weeks ago. And gnosticism essentially is this, is that anything material or physical is bad or evil.
[00:05:12] Anything that is spiritual or immaterial is good or even divine. And so that gnosticism really is a kind of, is an undercurrent that runs throughout a lot of the New Testament writings as they address this teaching. And so Peter is going to address this today as what he's going to call cleverly devised myths. Let's read this together. Let's start in verse 16.
[00:05:39] Peter says this, for we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. When Peter says, we there he's referring to the apostles.
[00:05:57] And what he's saying is the apostles were the eyewitnesses of Jesus. What's happened at this time of this writing is the apostles are getting old. They're going to start being persecuted for their faith. Several are going to be martyred for their faith. And in that vacuum, false teachers are stepping in and they are claiming to be apostles. And they're writing as if they are apostles. And what they are writing Peter calls cleverly devised myths.
[00:06:30] Now, that word cleverly, there is an interesting one that tells us there's something about it. There's just enough truth to make it stick, and they're designed to lead people astray.
[00:06:43] Here's an example of what was happening. Again, nothing new in today's world, where there were several false teachings about Jesus, mostly about his identity. Here's three common ones, and it was then and you'll see it today. Number one is that Jesus is really just a good prophet or teacher, right? He just was an extremely gifted human at teaching, and he is a prophet, but he is not God. The second one is that he became God at some point in his life. So he was born a normal human, normal human family, lived a normal human existence. But at some point, either through his extreme righteousness or a lot of people say at his baptism by John the Baptist, he became, quote unquote, God, that that status was conferred upon him. And the third false teaching goes along with that, that Jesus is not equal in divinity. Together, God, he's subordinate to God. And so Peter is writing this book of two. Peter to a world, to a church that is dealing with those things that are swirling around them. These false teachers are good at leading people astray. They have cleverly devised myths and cleverly designed argumentation to lead people from truth. But to address this, Peter states in 16 that Jesus has come in divine power as the son of God. To prove this, he's going to talk about the transfiguration where he was the eyewitness of majesty.
[00:08:24] Let's read 17 and 18 to set up Peter's discussion of the transfiguration. He says this in 17 four when he, Jesus, received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the majestic glory. This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. Verse 18. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.
[00:08:55] What Peter's doing here is he's drawing a sharp distinction between he and the apostles and the false teachers, the transfiguration in order to understand it, we need to go back to the book of Luke where this is written out. We're going to look at Luke, chapter nine, verses 28 to 35, and we're going to spend a little time there because Peter's referencing this event as proof of who Jesus is. So let's look at this together.
[00:09:24] Okay? So Luke 928 to 35 says this. He, Jesus, took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. A cloud came and overshadowed them and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud saying, this is my son, my chosen one. Listen to him. There is a lot going on here.
[00:10:08] Just want you to think about this for a second and pause and think. You're Peter. You've been with Jesus, you've probably seen him pray many times, but this time is totally different. As Jesus undergoes this transfiguration, what happens? Jesus is praying. His clothes become blazingly bright, like almost to the point that it would hurt to look at him. The appearance of his face is altered. He's literally glowing.
[00:10:40] Now if I'm Peter, I gotta be honest, I'm intrigued, but I'm also probably a little afraid here because of the stark change in Jesus as he's praying.
[00:10:53] Maybe it's similar to what John references about Jesus in revelation, one where he says one like a son of man clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace. And his, his voice was like the roar of many waters. And his face was like the sun shining in full strength.
[00:11:21] This is a glorious appearance of Jesus, not replicable in nature. It's super natural when Jesus is transfigured in his full glory. In addition to Jesus changed appearance, you have two men who show up with him.
[00:11:42] It's Moses and Elijah.
[00:11:45] And that should make us pause and go, why are Moses and Elijah there? How are Moses and Elijah there? Moses has been dead for hundreds of years. Elijah was supernaturally taken up into heaven 700 years prior to this in a chariot of fire. And suddenly they're here, they're back, they're standing with Jesus. They're talking with Jesus.
[00:12:08] And so we have to say what's going on? Like, what's the whole point here? Well, what's happened is this. Jesus has supernaturally intersected into the world in his full divinity.
[00:12:22] We're told in other places of scripture that he was found in appearance of a man, but there was nothing really to draw people to him at this place. People would be drawn to him because he is displaying his full divinity and full glory. Peter and James and John have now witnessed that they've seen it as he's transfigured. They get a glimpse of Jesus in his full glory.
[00:12:49] And what's really interesting about Peter is he has this experience. He sees Jesus in his full glory, and yet he goes on to deny him.
[00:12:59] Man. I think sometimes I can read scripture and I can see these people and I think, well, how could he be so, how could he be so stupid as to do that? And I'm reminded I probably could fall into that same trap. And so here you have transfigured Jesus. You have Moses and Elijah. Moses is there because he represents the Old Testament law.
[00:13:24] Moses is there. And what I think the imagery that we're drawing is that Jesus did what the law could not do. He fulfilled the law fully because he could offer full salvation from sin. And so to have this picture of Jesus transfigured with Moses back from the dead together shows that Jesus fulfilled that Peter, the apostles, would have made that connection. Elijah being there, represents the prophets, pretty much the writings of the Old Testament.
[00:14:00] And what this says is that Jesus has fulfilled the teachings of the prophets as well as the law. And so for Peter to be standing there, to see the transfigured Jesus in his full divinity, his full glory, to know it's Moses and to know it's Elijah, that would have been very overwhelming to him. But there's a third thing that happens that really takes it over the top, and that's this. The voice of God the father speaking. This is my beloved son.
[00:14:32] Listen to him. So not only do we have the transfigured Jesus in full glory, we've got Moses, we've got Elijah, we've got God saying, this is my son.
[00:14:45] What this does is it validates everything that Jesus had ever said about himself.
[00:14:53] It validates that Jesus is the son of God. It validates that Jesus is the messiah.
[00:15:02] Now, the question is, who does it validate it for?
[00:15:06] Did it validate it for Jesus? No, it validates it for Peter, James and John, the apostles. So what happens for them is now they have heard, this is my son. Listen to him. They, in contrast to the false teachers, can say, look, we were there, we heard it, we saw it. This is what we're to do. We're to listen to Jesus and believe in Jesus.
[00:15:31] And this is where God, in all his wisdom and really his grace has provided us today, sitting here in April of 2024, to be able to understand that as well.
[00:15:44] And so Peter is going to use this experience to really verify that Jesus is who he said he was. He will accomplish what he said he will accomplish even further. He goes on to talk about how it's more fully confirmed. Let's look at verses 19 and 21 of two. Peter 119 21. So he's just gotten done talking about we don't follow cleverly devised myths. We were eyewitnesses to his majesty. He received glory and honor with the voice of God, my beloved son. We ourselves heard it. We were with him. And then he says in verse 19, and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you would do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
[00:16:41] The prophetic word more fully confirmed here is Jesus.
[00:16:46] And he's saying this experience of the transfiguration is more fully confirmed because of Jesus.
[00:16:53] And I like what he says. You will do well to pay attention. You almost get the idea of this is kind of that fatherly advice.
[00:17:02] Pay attention to this. Hey, you need to know this. You need to understand this. And he says, the prophetic word is more fully confirmed in Jesus. And he uses an analogy as a lamp shining in a dark place.
[00:17:17] Jesus is the light. That light is shining in a dark place. Why? To guide us. So Peter's saying, look, we have Jesus as the light to guide us as we go through the dark place. And then he makes this statement, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
[00:17:40] It's tempting for us to think that this might be about salvation, trust in Jesus. But what Peter is referencing here is he's actually referencing the second coming of Jesus. It's not about salvation. And what he's saying is Jesus is the lamp to guide us until he comes again.
[00:18:01] And when he comes again, he's going to return in his full glory, like what Peter saw in the Transfiguration. This is why we celebrate communion. We celebrate communion and we use words such as, for as often as you drink this cup and eat this bread, you remember his death. Until he comes again, it's because we're looking forward to that second coming, and we're looking forward to when Jesus comes back.
[00:18:30] He goes on to say, no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. Remember, false teachers were lying about what the prophets had written. False teachers were lying about what the apostles had written regarding Jesus. Especially jewish religious teachers. Pharisees claimed to use Jesus or claimed to use the scriptures, but they left jesus out of the equation. So even though Jesus is with. Has been on earth, he has walked and talked and interacted. There's lots of people that are missing Jesus.
[00:19:04] So when the Pharisees especially looked at the scriptures, Jesus is left out. Jesus, though, has never been secretive about who he is. He's been very upfront with people all the time. Let's look at two verses.
[00:19:21] John 14 nine. Jesus says, whoever has seen me has seen the father.
[00:19:29] We need to understand how big a statement that really is.
[00:19:34] Because what Jesus is doing is he's saying, you've seen me, you've seen God. I am God.
[00:19:43] Sometimes we hear those things and we read them in scripture. And because we're on this side of the resurrection, we lose some of their power.
[00:19:53] In terms of how big a deal that would make.
[00:19:57] If Jesus is claiming to be God. If you have seen me, you've seen the father. You can understand why people were so angry with him.
[00:20:06] They didn't crucify him because he was walking around carrying lambs and hugging children. He did those things. However, they crucified him because he claimed to be God.
[00:20:17] And Peter's saying, look, he is God. I saw it. I was there. I witnessed it. Second place, Jesus talking about himself is Matthew 24 29 30.
[00:20:29] He's talking about the end times. And he says, immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light. And the stars will fall from heaven. And the powers of heaven will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the son of man. And then all the tribes of earth will mourn. And then they will see the son of man. Coming on the clouds of heaven with power, great glory. Jesus has always been very clear about who he was and what he was going to do.
[00:21:01] People missed it.
[00:21:04] The Pharisees had to have seen that. They knew the scriptures better than anybody. But they didn't want to believe it.
[00:21:14] They didn't want to accept it.
[00:21:17] And so therefore, they tried to kill him.
[00:21:21] Peter's eyewitness testimony of the Transfiguration is powerful.
[00:21:28] It was probably something that obviously stuck with him throughout the rest of his life. But it's not Peter's testimony, that makes that event true.
[00:21:39] If all we had was Peter's testimony. I was there. I saw it, I witnessed it. It's really not enough. It's a part of it. But if that's all we get, well, we're left to just having a human interpretation of this event. He addresses this in verse 21.
[00:22:00] He says, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
[00:22:13] No human being has ever developed anything on par with what's been revealed by God through the power of the Holy Spirit. It's a point Peter's making.
[00:22:26] The word of God is really one of the points that Satan is constantly attacking.
[00:22:34] Satan is constantly trying to undermine people's beliefs in the authority and validity and reliability of scripture.
[00:22:44] It goes back, and maybe it's his oldest trick. Genesis, chapter three. Did God really say he's drawing a doubt in the minds of Eve and Adam as to if God is who he said he was and would do what he said he would do?
[00:23:02] And I think this is why Peter has to tell us that men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. It's not man's idea. God has protected his word from the fallibility of our human ideologies and philosophies and concepts and ideas. He said, look, it's not from you, it's not from humanity, it's from me himself. Without that validity, all we have is events and our interpretation of those events.
[00:23:37] And Peter won't be able to say, look, I was there. I saw it, I witnessed it. He would just be another person claiming to have this secret knowledge of Jesus.
[00:23:49] But he's got the eyewitness account.
[00:23:52] Jesus himself has stated that all prophecy and scripture is about him. Remember, Jesus has never been quiet about who he was. Let's look at Luke 24 25 27 quickly. He says this, o foolish ones and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them and all the scriptures, the things concerning himself.
[00:24:27] So when we talk about the transfiguration and what it really means, it's really not for Jesus.
[00:24:34] It's a proof to Peter that he could trust and he could follow and he could have full. There's full validity in what Jesus has said and he has done.
[00:24:48] I think for us today we can believe and trust what is written about Jesus because it's not an interpretation. It's truth.
[00:24:56] It's the eyewitness testimony of Peter that we read about. It's the validation of God himself. So what is this truth? That Jesus is God?
[00:25:08] Anytime we hear that he is not, we can recognize that as being wrong. He is fully God. Two, Jesus is coming back in power and glory.
[00:25:23] As I've gotten older, I think about Jesus coming back, and I've got a new appreciation for it. I remember growing up in church and people would talk about Jesus coming back, and especially older people, more mature in the faith, they would have this anticipation and sometimes they'd pray. Even today, Lord Jesus. I remember going, well, maybe not today, right? I had a lot of life I wanted to live.
[00:25:50] But as I've gotten older, I go, yeah, I can see that. And I think that should give us a lot of hope that what we see now is, as scripture says, is through a glass, darkly.
[00:26:02] But at one point it all will be clear.
[00:26:06] Three. So what's number one?
[00:26:10] We need to pay attention because the evil day has arrived. It's here.
[00:26:17] We are living in a cultural moment where people and things are trending away from faith in Christ.
[00:26:28] The state of Theology survey, which was done by Ligonier ministries, they do a survey every year where they basically ask people their opinions on things that most orthodox Christianity would say are true, and then they report the results. Here's their conclusion of the last survey they did in 2022. They said this. Americans increasingly reject the divine origin and complete accuracy of the Bible, which means what we're doing here this morning, learning from God's word, most people in our culture would say, why are you doing that?
[00:27:06] That's not from God and it's not accurate. And this is where you get those argumentations, well, isn't really every holy book the same?
[00:27:14] Who's to say your Bible is better than the Book of Mormon or the Quran? Pick whatever text you want. It's one thing that's happening. But what about in the evangelical world of which we inhabit, people that go to church, that claim to have faith in Christ, this is happening.
[00:27:35] Doctrines, including the deity and exclusivity of Jesus Christ, as well as the inspiration and authority of the Bible, are increasing, increasingly being rejected.
[00:27:45] People are moving away from exactly what Peter has just told us.
[00:27:52] It's easy to look at that and become really discouraged and to become really down on what's happening around us, both within and without of the church. But let's be reminded of what Peter has told us, that there's going to be a time where the morning Star will rise in our hearts. So how do we pay attention in this world that is moving away from Christ? I think one of the things for each of us is that we work on the formation of our character. Why is that important? Because the way we're formed determines ultimately what we believe.
[00:28:30] Peter has talked about this in two. Peter, one, five, eight. He says, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, virtue with knowledge, knowledge with self control. Self control with steadfastness, steadfastness with godliness. Godliness with brotherly affection. Brotherly affection with love. If you're increasing in those things, you'll increase your witness, but you'll also increase your ability to stand in your faith.
[00:28:57] Second, so what? Once you've heard God's voice, every other message is now secondary, including your own.
[00:29:06] We live in a hyper individualistic culture.
[00:29:10] We all, we live in a world that says, you have claim to your truth, I have claim to my truth. And what happens if those two truths are opposite?
[00:29:26] Well, that's where culture has a hard time answering that. But that's the way we operate. We operate in this hyper individualized idea. I have my ideas, you have your ideas. We'll go from there. We almost hold our philosophies and ideologies and ideas to really godlike status.
[00:29:43] So sometimes we can speak, and it's like we are speaking as godlike. Catch the quotes. And so when we do these things, what happens is other people then can validate what we are saying.
[00:30:00] And when that happens, we're tempted to say, yeah, you know what? I am correct. I am right. I am. But once you have heard the word of God, every other, everything else is secondary to what God has said. That's hard for us. I have ideas, opinions.
[00:30:23] I hold to them. I believe them. I want them to be true. But unless I'm comparing that to what I'm reading in scripture, and let's say this, let's say I've got an idea, opinion, belief, and I bring it to God's word. And God's word says opposite of what I believe or think. Guess who needs to make a change? Yeah, this guy.
[00:30:46] And so, once we've heard God's voice, every other message is secondary. Last thing, if we can't trust ourselves, who can we trust? We can trust the scriptures. Here's why we know the apostles did not follow cleverly devised stories. They were eyewitnesses of Christ's majesty.
[00:31:05] That's important because historically, eyewitness accounts added validity to narratives. If people could say, I was there, I saw it, people gave that a lot of, of credence and a lot of weight. And so the authors of the scriptures, particularly Peter, in this chapter we looked at, he's saying, I was there.
[00:31:26] I'm not following a cleverly devised myth. I am an eyewitness to his majesty. The Bible is based on direct observations and experiences of Jesus's life, teachings and miracles written by people who saw and witnessed and heard. Two the message of the Bible is rooted in divine revelation, directly experienced. It's not from men.
[00:31:48] Any other religious text that we want to pick up and claim it to be divinely inspired is not only the Bible is divinely inspired.
[00:32:01] Lastly, the scriptures are not from human origin, they are from God.
[00:32:08] And so when we think of this idea of who's giving us the word, is it valid? Can we trust it?
[00:32:16] If it's from God and God's word, we can trust it.
[00:32:20] To sum this up, I would say this like this. What does Peter desire? We take away that we trust in Jesus and trust in Jesus alone. Why? Because he is God.
[00:32:34] First and foremost. He is God. He is who he said he was. He did what he said he's going to do. He will do what he said he is going to do. And the second thing is he's coming back.
[00:32:47] He's coming back in power and glory. Let's pray together.
[00:32:53] Jesus, we are thankful that in everything that we can deal with or look at or experience, that you are true. Lord, thank you for your words. Thank you for the evidence given through your word that you are who you say you are. You will do what you say you will do, Lord, thank you for the ability that we have to understand and to listen.
[00:33:21] Lord, we do pray for the return. We do pray that when you come back and restore everything that is wrong and everything that is broken, Lord, we look forward to that day with anticipation as your people. Thank you again for the validity and trustworthiness of your word. We pray this in your name. Amen.
