In the sermon 'From the Breath of God to Ink and Paper,' Scott Brown discusses the sufficiency and inerrancy of scripture. He explains how the Bible warns against adding or subtracting from the word of God and how it serves as a war manual for the church. Brown traces the origin of the canon of scripture, highlighting the testimonies of the Old and New Testaments, as well as the witness of Jesus Christ. He further discusses the transfer of God's words to ink and paper, noting the dual authorship of scripture involving both God and human writers. The sermon emphasizes the importance of embracing the whole counsel of God and understanding that rejecting the word of God leads to plagues and consequences.

Please open your Bibles to Revelation 22 and find verse 18. I'm just gonna read two verses, verses 18 and 19. This before you is inerrant, all sufficient, sweeter than honey, and it's the word of God. Verse 18, for I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book. And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the book of life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

Let's pray. Father, we're just so thankful that you have given us the word of truth to rescue us in so many ways and even from everlasting darkness to give us the light of your word in this world and for all eternity. Lord, we praise you for this wonderful testimony that you've given to us to guide us. And now, Lord, lead this church by your word, amen. Please be seated.

So the Bible begins with the serpent encouraging Eve to question God's word and the Bible ends with a warning not to question it, not to add or subtract from the word of God in the way that you think, in the way that you live in every area of life. This is a proclamation of the sufficiency of scripture. And what we find in, particularly in Revelation, but all over the Bible, God's inerrant word really is a war manual for fortifying the people of God and for the defeat of Satan. You know, next week and the following week we'll finally conclude Revelation. Next week we're gonna talk about the songs that are in revelation that we just might be a singing church.

The songs in Revelation are songs of victory and songs of delight. And then we'll move on and continue to finish this book. I know some of you are wondering if we're ever gonna finish this book, but the end is coming, if you know what I mean. But the inerrant word of God is the fortifying tool, it's the war manual of the church. I wanna talk this morning about that, and you have an outline in front of you.

You can see where I'm going in this message. But I wanna talk about how the Word of God got from the voice of God onto ink and paper. When was the canon of scripture complete? This passage answers that question. Who decided that it was complete?

What books were included? These are the questions that I want to try to deal with here. This is actually part two of a message that started last week, do not add or subtract. But here what I want us to see is the way that God put scripture together and also what it is, the fire, the hammer, the water that it is, the blessing that it is to the believer. And what's so clear in Revelation is that God has given his church a testimony to help them thrive during this war against the church, during the church age.

And how the church escapes the plagues of the soul as a result of obedience to the word of God. You know, it's interesting. I've read that there are 3% of Americans have a biblical worldview, and 1% of the rising generation has a biblical worldview. So we're talking about something that's so necessary and so disregarded. Solomon said, do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you, and you be found a liar.

Let God be true and every man be found a liar. Now, if you go to Revelation chapter 12, don't turn there. You find The description of this war, the breakout of the war of the devil, we read in verse seven in Revelation 12, "'A war broke out in heaven. "'Michael and his archangels fought with the dragon.'" The dragon is persecuting the church, fighting against the church, and then, but the whole message of this chapter is that the church prevails over the attacks of the devil. The dragon is always enraged at the church because she holds things that are so contrary to the devil's propositions.

But who is it that prevails? Those who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. That's verse 17 in Revelation chapter 12. Those who keep the commandments of God are the ones that prevail. Those who do not add, those who do not subtract from the word of God are those who are fortified to engage the war of the devil against them, and actually to prevail against the devil.

And by the way, I think we understand this by now. What is the message of the Book of Revelation? Jesus Christ wins. He's the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He's the last king standing.

Praise the Lord for that. So you have this war manual that is the book of Revelation. It's written to steady the church in times of persecution because her members are always under siege. They're under siege by the culture. They're under siege even by their own flesh, their own feelings and things like that.

And they need something to steady them, to keep them straight and narrow. And he has given them the canon of scripture. We said last time that the canon of scripture is not a C-A-N-N-O-N that you blow up ships with. It's a C-A-N-O-N, it's a compilation of the books of the Bible. And The very word speaks of the lines in a race.

The canon keeps you within the lines of the race so that you don't go off the track and off the cliff. So we have this reality that's being spoken of here that there are some who are tempted to distrust the word of God and to add or subtract. And at the same time, you know, Jesus made it very clear, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Jesus is quoting Moses in actually Deuteronomy 8 three. But the inerrant scriptures are wholly sufficient.

They're perfectly authoritative to govern all areas of faith and practice. And the word of God supplies the only guide, the only reliable guide with which you can govern your life. So that's what we're talking about here. Let me tell you about the 6, 000 year battle against the sufficiency of scripture. It began in the garden.

It actually began before the garden. It began with Lucifer. Lucifer rejected the sufficiency of Jesus Christ. He valued his autonomous will above the will of God. In fact, when you read the sections that speak of him, here's the prominent phraseology, I will, I will, I will, I will, not God's will.

He refused to be ruled. What happens to a Christian is that he realizes that his self-rule hasn't gone that well. And he wants to be ruled by God. He wants to be ruled by Jesus Christ. He wants to be ruled by a good shepherd, not a bad shepherd as is the devil.

But you know people who refuse to be ruled who don't want to be ruled by God. But what makes a Christian is a person whose heart is changed and they say, Lord, not my will but yours be done. I wanna be ruled by you. I want your will to rule in my life. Lucifer, the devil, wasted no time in approaching our first parents in the garden.

And he struggled with them over the sufficiency of scripture, the sufficiency of God. And the serpent said to Eve, has God really said, he was questioning the sufficiency of God. He was luring her into a life of autonomy. I read a book last week that's not been published yet by Jeff Johnson, and he says this, Satan was too crafty to attack man directly with brute force. He says he came with smooth words.

He came as Eve's friend, and he wanted to persuade her to question her memory, not really to come at her from the front, but from the side. To make her question her memory, has God really said? Is that what he really said? And the danger of autonomy is that plagues await the autonomous. They are plagues of the soul, even plagues of the body, plagues in relationships, plagues in your work, plagues everywhere, just like Egypt.

There are plagues everywhere. There's frogs everywhere, there's lice everywhere. You just can't get away from them because when you turn away from the word of God, there's always trouble. And the heartbreaks of the people of this world are just so voluminous, which we couldn't really catalog them, they're just so many, which is why the message of scripture from the beginning is this, do not learn the ways of the Gentiles because their ways are corrupt, their ways are futile. They don't work, and so God in His word is constantly luring us away from our own thoughts, from our own emotions, from our own culture into the culture of heaven to bring heaven down.

So God alone is really the one who is worthy to govern us. So these plagues from rejecting the word of God are so clear in the world. I think what we've been saying in the last two weeks is trust the word of God, escape the plagues, the depression, the confusion, the heartache from rejecting the truth. So I wanna talk about the canon of scripture, the whole counsel of God from Genesis to Revelation. It's so important that you imbibe the whole counsel of God, that you understand what the Bible says.

Christians are well known for picking their favorite verse. You know, you can even have the church of the favorite verse, they just go to favorite verses, but they don't actually scan the entire Word of God. And of course, for many years, we've encouraged one another to read the Word of God from Genesis to Revelation to understand the whole counsel of God. We've told fathers, it's your job in your home to bring the whole counsel of God to your children, not just your favorite verses while they're in your house. Don't let them leave home without it.

I remember somebody saying a Bible falling apart is usually owned by a person who isn't. And I think this, these verses, verses 18 and 19 really speak to that reality. Well, I'd like to talk about the canon of scripture, the origin of the canon of scripture, and you'll see in your outline how I'm gonna pursue this. I want to say that if you accept the proposition that Revelation was written at the end of John's life around 95 AD then the canon closed at 95 AD. The Bible itself shows us that the canon of scripture was not left up in the air.

And frankly, these verses before us today are the announcement of the closing of the canon of scripture. We talked about this matter of the canon last week. Muslims, I was told this week, teach their followers that at the second, that at the Council of Nicaea, the books that were considered for the canon were put on a table, and the table was shaken, and whatever was left on the table, Christian said was the canon of scripture. Well, there's a little bit different story from the testimony of scripture itself. And of course, Revelation 22, 18 and 19, I think make that very, very clear.

It's very clear from the New Testament and the Old Testament that the church embraced the canon of scripture immediately. This happened at the moment God revealed it. I want to demonstrate that in a minute. In a general introduction to the Bible by Norman Geisler, he quotes J.I. Packer saying, "'The church no more gave us the New Testament canon "'than Sir Isaac Newton gave us the force of gravity.

God gave us gravity by his work of creation and similarly he gave us the New Testament Canon by inspiring the individual books that make it up. So I'd like to walk through the Old and the New Testament because the Pentateuch, the prophets and the writings all bear witness to this fact. And I just wanna take you there and just show you. And I have many examples listed in your outline. I'm only gonna take two of those examples.

I'm gonna give you two examples of this testimony of the canon of scripture in the Old Testament and the testimony of the New Testament and then also the witness of Jesus Christ. I have lots of examples there listed in your outline and we'll just try to focus in on two. You might wanna consider the others. But the first example of the Old Testament is in Exodus 31, 18. And here, God wrote with his own hand in stone, verse 18.

And when he had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, so you have speaking, the word of God was delivered by word of mouth, he gave Moses two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone written with the finger of God. Here you have the inerrant word of God delivered by God's voice and then on the stone that God selected to write with his own finger the commandments of God. The second example is in Leviticus chapter one verses one and two. Here God speaks to Moses about the regulation of the worship of God in the tabernacle, and of course, we have embraced the idea that only God can order worship, that is the regular principle, God regulates worship by his own word, man does not invent worship, he follows what God has ordained, but here, this example, God, now the Lord called Moses, this is Leviticus 1, one, the Lord called Moses and spoke to him from the tabernacle of meeting, saying, speak to the children of Israel and say to them, when any one of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of the livestock, of the herd, and of the flock.

He's designing the sacrificial system to help people understand the seriousness of sin and that without the shedding of blood, there's no forgiveness of sin, there's no remission of sin. But notice, the Lord called Moses and spoke to him and said, speak to the children of Israel. And then he wrote it down. Moses wrote the Pentateuch. He wrote Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

He wrote down what God had communicated to him. Let's go to the prophets. The first example is in Jeremiah chapter one verse four. And here the word of the Lord came. As we find this phrase all over the Bible.

Verse four, Jeremiah one. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, And then verse seven, but the Lord said to me, and then verse nine, then the Lord put forth his hand and touched my mouth, and the Lord said to me, behold, I have put my words in your mouth. This was a miraculous act of God, and we don't know how this happened. There are details that we don't understand. I'm content with not understanding everything.

I don't understand everything about the natural world, and I don't understand everything about the spiritual world either. Similarly, in Jeremiah 30, verses one and two, the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, that's the quote, the word of the Lord, came to Jeremiah, saying thus speaks the Lord God of Israel. Notice the language, it's so clear. The Lord speaks, the Lord calls, the Lord says, right? And then says what?

Write in a book for yourself all the words that I have spoken to you. God speaks, man writes. That's how scripture was delivered in the prophets. Now The second example are really the last words of David in 2 Samuel 23, one and two. And here, David says, "'The Spirit of the Lord spoke through me.

I'll read the text. Second Samuel 23 verse two. The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me and his word was on my tongue. Proverbs, of course, witnesses to its authority as well. Let's go to the New Testament.

Let's look at the witness of the New Testament writers. Again, I'm just grazing over the surface to give you representative examples of this truth of scripture. I'm gonna give you two examples here in the New Testament. The first example is 1 Peter 1, verses 22 through 25. Trent preached on this a few months ago.

Here in this passage, Peter does something striking. It really should take our breath away. He cites the Old Testament and calls it the word of God. And he's quoting Isaiah, verse 23, says, having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and abides forever. He's saying that a person is born again because the word of God penetrates the heart.

And the heart is softened. And the heart says, I believe this, that's what he's talking about. Salvation is the result of the penetration of the word of God into the heart. We know that Our hearts are hard until God softens them. God says, I'll give you a heart of flesh.

You have a heart of stone, I'm gonna give you a heart of flesh. Do you have a heart of flesh? Or are you hardened to the word of God? Does it penetrate? Do you love it when it penetrates?

Are you hardened to it? If you're hardened to it, you're not a believer. If you're softened to it, you know that God's changed your heart because every person is born into this world with a hard heart. That's the doctrine of original sin. But then he goes on, he says, you were born again, in other words, you became a new person through the word of God, which lives and abides forever.

But then he says this, and he quotes Isaiah, he quotes the Old Testament. Because all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man is as the flower of the grass. The grass withers, The flower fades, but the word of the Lord endures forever. But he doesn't stop there. He says, and remember this is Peter speaking, and this is the word which was preached to you.

Here in just these few verses, Peter is saying the Old Testament is the word of God and the preaching of the apostles is the word of God. That's the claim of scripture. He equates the gospel with the word of God and the Old Testament with the word of God and the apostles preaching as the word of God. The apostles believe that the Old Testament was the word of God. The second example is in 2 Peter 3, 15, and 16, where Peter now, Peter refers to Paul's letters as the word of God, and he says, "'Also our beloved Paul, according to the wisdom given him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them these things.

And I like this phrase, in which some things are hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction. But listen to this last phrase. This is in verse 16 of 2 Peter 3, "'as they do also the rest of the Scriptures. So here Peter is referring to Paul's letters as the Word of God and the rest of the Scriptures as the word of God, which include the Apostles Doctrine and the entire Old Testament. So those are two examples of the internal witness of the authority of scripture, of the 66 books of the Bible, the canon of scripture which was closed in Revelation 22, 18 and 19.

Now, let's go to the witness of Jesus Christ, the witness of Jesus Christ. I'm gonna give you five examples for a purpose. First of all, the Lord Jesus Christ himself is and was the word of God. In John 1, 1, in John 1, 14, we read, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. Jesus Christ is the embodiment of God's Word.

He is the representative of God and all of God's words. He says that he only speaks the things he hears from his Father. He speaks the Word of God. The second example is in Hebrews 1, 1, where God spoke in the Old Testament and he has spoken through Jesus Christ. I'll read it, Hebrews 1, 1.

"'God, who at various times and in various ways "'spoke in time past to the fathers, "'by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his son. So God speaks through his son as he has spoken through the prophets and the fathers, which I take to be the patriarchs, the 12 patriarchs. And then the third example is John 539. John 539. And Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees.

He says, you search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life, and these are they which testify of me. The scriptures testify to Christ. Christ himself testifies to the scriptures, and he is the scriptures. The fourth example is in John 10, 35. Here Jesus is quoting the Old Testament.

He's quoting a line in the Old Testament. He called them gods. Okay, this is from the Psalms. He says, if he called them gods, of whom the word of God came, In other words, the word of God came in the Old Testament, but then he says, and the scripture cannot be broken. The scripture cannot be broken.

In that one verse, He collects up the entire Old Testament scripture and himself and he says they cannot be broken. The scriptures cannot be broken. And the reality of this passage of scripture that when you reject the word of God, the plagues fall upon you. This is the reality that everyone must understand. If you break the words of Scripture, Scripture will break you, and you'll finally be broken forever if you don't turn to him and don't cry out to him for a soft heart to replace your heart of stone.

The fifth example is in John chapter 6 verse 63 Where he says that his words give life. It is the spirit who gives life. The flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit and they are life. Spirit and they are life.

In other words, Jesus, the living word of God, is the personification of God's revelation. He came to reveal God, he came to speak God's words to mankind. Moses in Deuteronomy 32 explains it like this, they are your life these words are your life. Do not add, do not subtract, these words are your life. Walk within the lines of the canon of scripture.

Keep the commandments of God. They are manna from heaven. Okay, so With the testimony of Jesus Christ, with the testimony of the New Testament authors, with the testimony of the prophets and the writings and the Pentateuch, with these things, there are three options that you have, that anyone has for how to interpret these things. The first option is that there are errors in the Old Testament, but Jesus did not know about them, Which means he's not God, he's not omniscient, he's not the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, he does not know all things as he claimed. Second, there were errors, but Jesus knew about them, and he intentionally covered them up, which would make him a liar.

Many people have come to that conclusion. The third option is that there are no errors, which means that he was who he said he was. And the Bible doesn't let you maintain neutrality about his word. He's either ignorant and not God, or he's a liar, or he is who he said he was. And every person standing before this book has to answer that question for themselves.

So you cannot believe in Jesus and reject the infallibility and the sufficiency and the authority of scripture. Because scripture, if you want to believe in scripture, that's what you get. If you don't wanna believe that, you think you just might as well go do what you wanna go do. So all this to say, Christians did not invent this. This was not conceived of.

The authority and the infallibility and the sufficiency of Scripture was not invented at the Council of Nicaea, where books were put on a table and shaken. This was established at the writing. It was established by what the Old Testament said about itself. It was established by what Jesus Christ said about himself. It was established by what the apostles said about this word.

Now you might not embrace this, you might say that's circular reasoning, but this is what the Bible teaches. Everything, by the way, is circular reasoning. Nobody ever escapes circular reasoning. Maybe someday we can talk more about that. Let's talk about the transfer of God's words to ink and paper.

Well, we've already read some things that give us some tips, but how did God get his words onto ink and paper? And there are some, there are theories. There's the dictation theory. I think it falls short of what the Bible says. There is what's called the organic theory, which I think does bear witness to what we've just read about.

It's the idea of dual authorship, that God was working with man. God spoke and men wrote and then they communicated it verbally. By the way, the Word of God is not something that was just passed down by verbal transfer. It's not like playing the telephone game. They wrote it down.

Moses wrote it down, the prophets wrote it down, David wrote it down, the apostles wrote it down, Jesus wrote it down. This was not by verbal transmission, as people so often say. I wanna give you a couple of examples. In Jeremiah 36, the first example here is from the prophet Jeremiah again. And here, Jeremiah heard, and then he wrote it, and then it says that he wrote it through a scribe who has a name, he has a name.

Now it came to pass in the fourth year of Jehoiachim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, that this word came to Jeremiah from the Lord saying, take a scroll of a book and write on it "'all the words that I have spoken to you "'against Israel and against Judah.'" And then, skipping down to verse four, "'Then Jeremiah called Baruch the son of Neriah, "'and Baruch wrote on a scroll of a book at the instruction of Jeremiah, all the words, all the words of the Lord which he had spoken to him. So Jeremiah in this case used a scribe, it's called an amanuensis. We find the same thing in the book of Romans where the Apostle Paul uses Tertius, a man by the name of Tertius, to be a scribe. When we get to the book of Romans in a few weeks, we'll cover that situation. Verse 10 in Jeremiah 36, "'Then Baruch read from the book, the words of Jeremiah, in the house of the Lord, in the chamber of Gemeriah, the son of Shaphan, the scribe, in the upper court, at the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house, in the hearing of the people.

Do you see this transmission sequence? God speaks to Jeremiah, Jeremiah writes it down in a scroll, he uses Baruch to continue to write it, And then Baruch takes it into the house of the Lord and he speaks it to all the people. This is how the word of God gets to people. God speaks it, the prophets write it down, and then those who are appointed to preach it, preach it. This is how the Word of God gets into the world.

This is the way that God designed it. It's a very natural, organic way. It's Not like dictation exactly, it's relational and it's personal and it's actually verifiable. Notice, God's word, Jeremiah's word, Baruch and then the people. This is how the word of God is cross verified by various means of communication.

The second example is in Jeremiah 1, one and two, I love this section of Jeremiah. Jeremiah's probably 20 years old when God comes to him in Jeremiah 1, 1, which makes it so clear, God really does desire to use young people. If you're 20 or 16 or 18 or 22, don't despise, don't despise your youth. God often appoints the young to be his instruments. Let you be one of his instruments in the world.

Jeremiah 1, one. The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah of the priests who were in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin, to whom the word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah, the son of Ammon, the king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign. By the way, just a quick comment of a rabbit trail. The Word of God is like no other book. It speaks in such detail about the historical matters.

These things happen in time and space. They happen in history with real kings that we know about today, not from the Bible. Real places that you can go visit today. This is nothing like mythology. It's about very specific time frames and very specific kings and very specific words that are actually connected to specific incidences that took place in space and time.

Okay, enough of that. Jeremiah 2 verses one through nine, We have another kind of example. Jeremiah hears the word of the Lord and he writes it down. Jeremiah 2, verse four. Hear the word of the Lord, O house of Jacob, and all the families of the house of Israel.

Thus says the Lord. You read this over and over again in the prophets. Thus says the Lord. That's a declaration of the sufficiency of scripture. And so what was heard from the mouth of God was written down.

Luke 18 verse 31, we find a situation where Jesus tells his 12 disciples that the things written in the prophets, not passed down verbally, the things written in the prophets will be fulfilled. Verse 31 in Luke 18, Then he took the 12 aside and said to them, behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of God will be accomplished. They were written, they will be accomplished. Another example is the Apostle Paul tells his readers that he himself, he the Apostle Paul, is writing the words of God. What a bold claim that is.

1 Corinthians 14, 37. If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that these things which I write to you are the commandments of God. You know, none of us would say anything like that, I hope. But the Apostle Paul said, I am writing the commandments of God. In other words, don't take Scripture lightly.

Don't take the letters to the churches lightly. Don't take John the apostles' letter to the churches lightly in Revelation. Don't take the Old Testament lightly, don't take the prophets lightly, don't take the writings lightly, don't take the gospels lightly. Here Paul is making this claim. Now, As we've encountered many times in the book of Revelation, God tells John to write down the words of the prophecy.

He does it in chapter one, verse five. He does it in chapter one, verse seven, verses 10 and 11. He does it in verse 19. Four times in the first chapter, there's the command for John to write down the words of the prophecy. Let's look at 1.11, Revelation 1.11.

This is the occasion where Jesus himself, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the King of kings and Lord of Lords, he tells him to write to these seven churches in Asia, which are in a small geographical area in Turkey. He says, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day and I heard behind me a loud voice as of a trumpet saying, I am the alpha and the omega, the first and the last. What you see, be careful with the language, not what you hear, what you see. Remember Revelation is a book of pictures, it's pictorial theology, it's doctrine in pictures, and a lot more. Write down what you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia.

Then in verse 19 in Revelation 1, the command is repeated, Write the things which you have seen and the things which are and the things which will take place after this. Now, when we talk about the songs and the prayers that we might be a singing church and a praying church next week. You'll notice that John was writing down not just what he saw, but also what he heard. What he heard. And he heard songs.

And he heard words of songs. And he wrote them down. And we're gonna talk about them in some detail next week. I can't wait to get there. So in the book of Revelation, we find a tremendous example of how the transmission of scripture took place.

God spoke, he revealed, and men wrote it down. I think that's the primary message of scripture. Now, let's talk about the instrument of the delivery of the words. Again, we're talking about how the word of God came from God's mouth to ink and paper that you have before you hear this warning. The instrument, And the first example, probably the central example is in 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17.

2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, that's the key phrase, inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. That's perhaps one of the clearest connections of the sufficiency of scripture. This is why do not add, because you are thoroughly equipped with what God has already written. Do not subtract because you're thoroughly equipped for every good work and don't minimize the word of God, don't add or subtract to it.

We talked last week that adding is legalism, it's adding things that God hasn't said, and subtracting is antinomianism, it's actually minimizing the importance of the word of God. So this came by inspiration of God, inspiration of God. That's a really critical word, I hope everybody remembers it and particularly you children, inspiration means, are you ready? God breathed. God breathed, Exactly.

Yeah, in fact, in fact, it's actually, in the original Greek language, it's two words. Phao, God, and noups das, breathed, God breathed. Inspiration, that one word inspiration means God breathed. So, how did God breathe his word? It's like wind.

The words wind and spirit and breath all help us to understand how God did this. Well I had such a delight this last week to have about 40 of your little children and I was walking them around and showing them trees and oh we stopped. And we were talking about wind and breath. And I said, do you see that tree? Do you see how the leaves are moving?

The wind is moving the trees. That's what God does with his word, he moves your life. It's his breath, his breath moves your life. And then we went out and we were looking at a lake and the wind was blowing over the lake and you could see the waves of wind blowing over the lake, making wind in the water as waves. And I said, look at that, look at that lake.

You can't see the wind, can you? No, the wind blows where it wishes and you can't see it. But the Word of God is like that. The Word of God blows over your life and it makes the leaves of your trees move. It makes the water of your life to ripple and be cleansed and to feel the blowing of the wind.

The second example of this is in 2 Peter 1, 20 to 20, and we're talking about the instrument of the delivery of the word of God. And we have just spoken of the fact that it's the breath of God. The Word of God is God-breathed. It's like wind. But in Saint Peter 1, 20 and 21, we learn that the words of Scripture did not arise out of man's creativity, not man's wisdom, not on individual men's passion, not the bit of personality of their spirit necessarily, Not man's private opinions or emotions, not man's theories, I'll read it to you.

Knowing this, that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man let that hang no prophecy ever came by the will of man This is how God actually collaborates with man's spirit and the writers of scripture. But, not the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit, by the breath of God, by God himself, by the thea nubstas, by the inspiration of scripture. They were moved like the wind. Another example is in John 14 26 where the Lord Jesus Christ is with his disciples in the upper room. His last words to his disciples before his crucifixion, he's just telling them that he's leaving and they've loved him and followed him.

He says, but the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name. He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all the things I said to you. In other words, Jesus is speaking to the apostles, the writers of scripture, and he's saying, I, by my spirit, I will bring everything to mind. You know, when somebody tells you something, it's really hard to remember the exact words. It wasn't that way with the writers of scripture.

Jesus Christ, by the power of his Holy Spirit, by the Helper, He helped them to remember. He helped them to remember like you and I can't remember. And they wrote the word of God. And they didn't do it by their own emotional response, they did it because God, by the Holy Spirit, brought it to their mind. That's how it happened.

Somebody asks Charles Spurgeon, how do you defend the Bible? He said, I don't defend the Bible, I just let it out. It's like a lion. Let's talk about the consequences of adding and subtracting. And if anyone takes away from the words of this book, of this prophecy, God shall take away His part from the Book of Life and the Holy City and from the things which are written in this book.

So if a person's heart remains hard then they will not be written in the Book of life, they will not enter the holy city, and they won't experience the heavenly glories that we've just actually spent 20 weeks talking about in Revelation 21 and 22, the most complete doctrine of heaven that exists in the Bible. And that he says it plagues. The word refers to hitting and flogging and beating and punishment. The blows, there are blows that await those who reject the Word of God, who disobey God. It never goes well.

What I told the children in this church is look when you when you step outside the Word of God the devil will slap you around. So don't don't step outside the canon of scripture. Don't add or subtract from it. If you take lightly the word of God, then God shall take away your part from the book of life and from the holy city and from the things written in this book, there's such a dire warning. I wanna close though with the power of the word of God.

I'm Going to close this message with the passage that was read at the beginning of this service. Open your Bibles to Psalm chapter 19, Find verse seven. Psalm 19 is such a beautiful passage. The first six verses speak of general revelation. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows His handiwork.

Day unto day utters speech. Night unto night reveals knowledge. There's no speech nor language where their voice is not heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth and their words in the world. In other words, everybody knows there's a God.

Everybody knows by what God has made. Romans chapter one makes that very clear. But then in verse seven, he speaks of special revelation. This is the revelation of the written Word of God, the breath of God transferred by the Holy Spirit and written on ink and paper. And I just wanna give praise to God for the life-giving nature of the word of God.

How good it is not to add or subtract. The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. It changes your life. The testimony of the Lord is sure, it's reliable. Making wise the simple, It makes you wiser than you ever were.

The statues of the Lord are right. They never lead you astray. They rejoice the heart. They make you happy. They change your life.

They change your emotions. They change your thoughts to think rightly. The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. It causes you to see reality. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever.

It's evergreen, it's always giving, it's always working. The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. It puts you on the foundation of truth, not lies. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold. It's more valuable than gold.

Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. It's the source of sweetness. Moreover, by them is your servant warned. It warns you, keeps you out of trouble. And in keeping them there is a great reward.

It pays off and it keeps paying for all eternity. Well, that's why David said in Psalm 119, verse 103, how sweet are your words to my taste, yes sweeter than honey in my mouth. The power of the Word of God is proclaimed in so many places. I found it to be so true. It is sweeter than honey and the honeycomb.

It is true. It's so good. Henry Smith writing over a hundred years ago, he said, we should always have the word of God before us as a rule and believe nothing but what it teaches, love nothing but what it prescribes, hate nothing but what it forbids, and do nothing but what it commands. Charles Spurgeon was preaching a sermon on Hebrews 4, 12 and 13, which I have listed in your outline here. The word of God is, you know, mighty, more powerful.

It's like a sword. He says this, Why the book has wrestled with me, the book has smitten me, the book has comforted me, the book has smiled on me, the book has frowned on me, the book has clasped my hand, the book has warmed my heart, The book weeps with me and sings with me. It whispers to me and it preaches to me. It maps my way and holds up my goings. It was to me the young man's best companion and It is still my morning and evening chaplain.

Praise the Lord for the word of God. It's reliable. Do not add, do not subtract any part of it from any part of your life and it will go well with you. Would you pray with me Lord we're so thankful that your word, it's food and it nourishes, it's honey and it sweetens, it's a sword and it penetrates and it's a fire and it cleanses everything and it's gold and it's medicine that soothes. Lord we're just so thankful that you've given us your word.

I pray that we in this church would cleave to it with all of our hearts as the days passed in a world where there's such a deception and so few believe that your word is true. But Lord, we believe it's true. And we're so grateful that you gave it to us. Amen.