PREACHER I KNOW THAT CANNOT BE TRUE

By Curtis Pugh

How often has someone listened to the Bible being faithfully taught and repeated the words of our title: “Preacher, I know that cannot be true”? Every person has their own ideas and beliefs about God. And a person's belief system – their doctrine – is one of the most precious things to them. If you doubt that last statement perform a little experiment. Try to convince them that God is sovereign and that their salvation is in the hands of God. Try convincing them that salvation “...is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy,” (Romans 9:16). Tell them that man's will has nothing to do with being born again as John 1:13 says: “Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

How many times has someone said in words or substance, “Preacher, I heard what you said, but I know what so-and-so says about that verse and what you say cannot be true”? The world is full of people whose business is not to teach the Bible, but rather their continual occupation seems to be to explain away the Bible. And they have explained away so much that the God of the Bible is no longer the God of most professing Christians. They have explained away so much that few know how God saves lost sinners. In short, the world – the world of religious people – is full of unbelievers. And that is what people are who go about explaining away the plain meaning of Scripture instead of believing what the Bible plainly says.

Jesus said, “For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?” (John 5:46-47). The principle here is a reciprocal one. Those who believe the writings of Moses – the Old Testament Scriptures – believed in Christ when He came. And those who truly believe in Christ also believe the Bible today. They do not say about it, “Preacher, I know that cannot be true.”

Paul warned of those who give the appearance of being followers of Christ: they “walk” he said. “For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ,” (Philippians 3:18). And to the congregation at Corinth he wrote, “...Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works,” (2 Corinthians 11:14-15). Those who twist the Scriptures do so to their own destruction for Peter said they “are unlearned and unstable,” and they “wrest, [Paul's writings] as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction,” (2 Peter 3:16). Warning: do not say that the Bible cannot be true when it says something you do not like!