Many who accept or reject the sovereignty of God do so based upon a faulty understanding of the word and of the doctrine. The common assumption is that God’s sovereignty means He is irresistible and without limitations in the scope of His power or practice in the affairs of men. But, is this what sovereignty means?
How can we know God? Are there multiple ways to get to God? What does the Bible mean when it says that Christ is the express image of the Father?
The six-day creation story as found in Genesis (along with the seventh day of rest) provides a perfect picture of the seven dispensations as generally taught by dispensationalists. Match each day of creation with the corresponding dispensation and you see some very interesting parallels.
Men have been “handling the word of God deceitfully” (2Corinthians 4:2) ever since the devil first taught Eve how. From Cain to Balaam, from Jehudi to the scribes and Pharisees, from the Dark Age theologians to present-day scholars, the living words of the Almighty God have been prime targets for man’s corrupting hand. The attacks on the Word of God are threefold: addition, subtraction, and substitution. From Adam’s day to the computer age, the strategies have remained the same. There is nothing new under the sun.
Apocrypha is the name for 14 books written between about 200BC and AD100. Apocrypha, meaning “hidden” or “secret”, refers to the mysterious nature of their origin. Neither their authors nor the circumstances of their writings are known. Neither the Jews nor the early Christians accepted them as inspired scripture. The books themselves do not claim inspiration. There are no “Thus saith the Lord’s”. Although the New Testament has 263 direct quotations from and 370 allusions to the Old Testament, there is not a single reference to the books of the Apocrypha. It was at the Council of Trent, on April 8th, 1546, that the pope declared tradition and the Apocrypha to be canonical and authoritative. These books teach several false doctrines and contain many inaccurate historical facts.
