Articles
Lots of Teachings, One Word of God
How good are you at sifting through all that is done in the name of religion?
Some people teach that "it doesn't matter what road you are on" with regards to your belief's "because they all wind up at the same place" where they will tell you God will approve of what you believed and did in His name, and graciously welcome you into Heaven.
Two problems with that, and the first one greatly outweighs the second. First, God does not say that, and the Bible does not teach that. In fact, it teaches just the opposite. Second, many religious beliefs are in stark opposition to each other in their beliefs. If we consider two differing teachings, we know both can't be correct and given the magnitude of differing teachings in our world, most likely neither is correct.
In 1 Cor 14, the Apostle Paul is talking about some spiritual gifts that the first century church was arguing about, one of them being speaking in tongues (or foreign languages). People seemed to really desire that gift, and Paul is telling them there are other gifts much more valuable, which they should desire. In the midst of his direction to the church, In vs-19, he says, "But in the church I would rather speak five intelligible words to instruct others than ten thousand words in a tongue."
Perhaps that's a poor parallel to draw, but there are so many teachings out there that almost make religion unintelligible, totally confusing, and often rendering people unable to know anymore after they listen to them than before they did. But we have the Bible, the living breathing Word of God, and in it we find the intelligible words that we need to hear so we can sort out the pure Gospel from the mess that our world has created. Plain and simple, the Bible tells us all we need to know.
Peter, writing about making certain we are following the true Gospel of Christ, said, "His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness." (2 Peter 1:3). Where does Peter say we get everything we need to please God?.... through our knowledge of Him, and that ONLY comes untainted through studying His Word. If it comes from man, it has the ability to get corrupted.
When we know what is in the pages of the Gospel, we can then sort through the noise in the religious world, and live according to the plan set forth for us in scripture. The intelligible words we need to hear don't come from mankind, no matter how appealing they may be, but scripture is flawless, not hard to understand, and it is God's way of telling us what we MUST hear. Our job is to learn the scriptures, then carefully sort through the mess of teachings out there, keeping what we can confirm and establish as truth according to the scriptures. Only then can we have full confidence that we are pursing God according to HIS will, and His will only.
I pray you study God's word often and carefully. Bibles collecting dust are useless until we open them up and absorb what is in them.
