Assaults on Jesus Christ
Introduction
A. Faithful children of God must constantly contend for the Faith, Jude 3.
B. Assaults are directly against the Bible, the Family, and against the Church.
1. They are often disguised and subtle, with apparently other targets in mind.
2. For example, some issues are framed as equality and justice issues when the point is to destroy the pattern of authority in the Scriptures.
C. We are going to focus on a few of the more prominent insults directed against our Lord.
I. Unidentified Flying Objects
A. Like the fascination with “Big Foot” and the “Loch Ness” monster, they always promise that the evidence to prove their existence may be discovered any day now. So they have said for centuries.
B. Evidence is always dubious – night sightings, strange lights, unexplainable visions, etc.
1. Much like all superstition, it does not have to offer proof: only doubt, fear, maybe, etc.
2. The evidence that God offers is always in the daylight, before sober and alert witnesses.
C. Isaiah 8:19-22 Mediums chirp and mutter. “To the teaching and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn.”
1. Isaiah 29:4 voice of a ghost, whisper, low to the ground
2. Even the modern séances are done at night, with the lights turned down low. Maximum possibility to deceive and stir up fear… Ooooo ghosts!
D. Eric von Daniken, Chariots of the Gods, CBS Special Report
1. Attacks Ezekiel as seeing not God but Extra-Terrestrials.
2. Ridicules the Ark of the Covenant as a box given by the ET’s as a power generator. Uzzah died by an electrical shock!
3. Poses the impossibilities that early man could have built the Pyramids of Egypt, Stonehenge, the idols of Easter Island, or the Nazca Lines in Peru.
a. Assumes that Adam was an Ape-man and inferior to modern man. Would not dare to admit that maybe they were genetically superior and maybe smarter than we are today.
b. Full of half-truths. What would you expect from a Bar-tender! Archaelogists have found evidence of how and when these structures were built and where they quarried the rock. They were very smart in mathematics and some of their technological discoveries have been lost and we have yet to discover them in modern times.
E. The Sacrifice of Christ was uniquely foreordained before the foundation of the world.
1. 1 Peter 1:20
2. Exodus 20:11 In six days God created the heavens and the earth.
3. Christ’s death for man was decided before the stars and planets were created.
4. 2 Peter 3:10-13 God who created the heavens and earth will also destroy and judge us eternally. Therefore, it would be wise for men to live in holiness and godliness.
II. “Scientific” speculation on the Age of the Geologic Tables, “Fossil fuels,” etc.
A. Unbelieving archaeologists and Egyptologists happily speculate that the artifacts that they find are thousands of years older than the Bible would allow.
1. Of course Geologists declare that the strata that they name as Pre-Cambrian, Cambrian, Paleozoic, etc. must be millions of years old.
2. They may be very smart but they are not scientists. Science means knowledge. Science is not speculation. Even an “educated” guess or speculation is not science. Much of what is called “science” today is actually better called “junk” science…. That is, “falsely so-called science”. 1 Timothy 6:20, 2 Corinthians 10:5 exalts itself against the knowledge of God.
3. Reminds us the speculation of the dates set for the end of the world: 1881, 1914, 1970, … Remember the cult that committed suicide in order to join the space ship that accompanied a recent comet?
B. Luke 3:23-38 The genealogy of Jesus runs all the way back to Adam, the first man created by God.
1. Cannot be 20,000 years ago, let alone 20 million or 4 billion years ago
2. We cannot reject Genesis without also rejecting the testimony of Jesus Christ in Luke.
3. Add to that Jesus’ statements in Matthew 19 of God created Adam and Eve. What God has joined together…
C. The Evidence for Ancient dates is highly speculative. It is not “science” any more than “Darwinism” is science. Or Carl Sagan or Bill Nye were scientists when they speculated on the age of the earth.
1. They always assume the thing that must be proved.
2. Geo-chron Labs that date rocks according to radioactive decay principles. Assume a uniform quantity of Parent to Child ratio where the radioactive element turns into an inert element. Such a thing does not exist. (Just like the missing links) They must assume an original quantity of the inert element based on their assumption of how old the rocks are.
3. Archaeology Ages such as the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age … assume a world uniformity of history and discovery. There is no uniformity. The discovery in one place was not the same as in other places. (China for example) See for example, Genesis 4:22 iron and brass work discovered even before the Flood of Noah.
4. Ancient dates for the reigns of the Pharaohs that go back thousands of years before the Bible do not always take into account co-regency and dual kingdoms in the north and the south with separate Pharaohs reigning concurrently. As for example in the case of Israel’s divided kingdom and kings in Judah concurrent with the kings of Israel.
III. Assaults on the Home as ordained by God in Jesus Christ
A. Blatant Nakedness
1. Beaches, Sports events, Advertisements, Weightloss/Exercise/Health efforts, Fashions.
2. Genesis 3:8-11. “I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” (2:25 both naked and were not ashamed) 3:21, “LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments (tunics) of skins and clothed them.”
3. Leviticus 18:6-19 not uncover the nakedness…
4. Leviticus 20:11-20 nakedness
5. “None of you shall approach any one his close relatives to uncover nakedness. I am the LORD.”
6. Implied: Nakedness is uncovered for Sensual Purposes.
7. Implied: Clothing covered the body to minimize the sensuality (not to enhance)
8. Jeremiah 5:8 “neighed after neighbor’s wife”
B. Gender Roles: Language has been changed to alter the respect and order that God ordered in what they call a “patriarchal society”. God is presented as UNJUST! God is accused of treated women as inferior or second-class citizens, down-trodden, abused.
1. Lord’s Prayer, Matthew 6:9 “Our Father in heaven…”
a. Why not “Our Mother in heaven”?
b. Not physically male or female, but Creator and LORD!
2. 1 Timothy 2:8-15 Men must lead in prayer, women must not exercise authority over a man. Adam was formed first….
3. 1 Timothy 3:2 Overseer must be “Husband of one wife…” v. 12 Deacons also
4. Acts 20:28; 1 Peter 5:2; Hebrews 13:17 must give an account.
C. The Justification of Fornication and sensuality as an aid to marriage.
1. Some argue that it is better to “Live together, sleep together, etc. to determine compatibility.”
a. Deuteronomy 22:13-21 Issue of virginity and marriage. Fornication punishable by death as evil in the midst of the people of Israel.
b. Deuteronomy 22:23 stone both the man and the woman (betrothed virgin) guilty of fornication. Purge the evil from your midst.
2. Some argue that it is “Better to fornicate than to marry too young and begin a family.”
a. Material and professional goals, money and higher standard of living considered as undeniable good. Matthew 6:19-33
b. Cost of raising children is too high. With birth control pills and abortion, one can remain unmarried but sleep with whom you please with small risk of conception.
1. Cost of health care, insurance, school, dentistry, karate, sports, music lessons, college education, Cost of hotels, restaurants, vacations (Disney World, multiply the admission by the number of children that you are taking) … Children are priced out of the market. Only the rich can afford.
2. But if you lower your demands of normal child rearing expense, eliminate or maneuver around the big ticket items, learn what is necessary and what is luxury, you can enrich yourself with the joys of people over things. … If you are married!
c. The popular lie is that women can conceive children whenever they like – even after ten or even after twenty years of fornication, taking birth control medicine, and perhaps even a few abortions. Ignores the fact that children are a gift of God. Ignores the possible damage done by the medicines to the reproductive systems, or even the damage done by the abortions themselves.
1. God may not be ready when you are ready. Genesis 21:1; 25:21; 29:31; 30:22; God gives conception to men at His own discretion.
2. You may have lost your only chance to become a parent by wasting your youth. Psalm 127:4, “Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth.”
D. Myth of Global Over-Population has discouraged childbirth
1. Scarcity of children in marriages causes disintegration of marriages and homes and the Divine Social Security system. The elderly become a burden on society and on their few children that were chosen so that they might prosper. But they will not want to share their prosperity because they want to use it for their own selfish pleasures – as the spoiled children that they are.
a. Eclipse of the value of the elderly sage. Rejection of their counsel and wisdom.
b. Worship of youth and youthful ideas as age is despised and dishonored.
c. Ephesians 6:2-3 Honor your father and mother (this is the first commandment with a promise), that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” Jesus rebuked the Pharisee tradition called “Corban” which justified the neglect of the duty of honoring them with support in their years of declining strength.