The Alternative

Dr. Tony Evans: There is no higher appeal that you can appeal to than the Word of God.

Guest (Male): Dr. Tony Evans says the Bible isn't just a good source. It's the final word.

Dr. Tony Evans: What the Supreme Court is to the laws of our land, the Bible is the supreme authority of God's revelation in history.

Guest (Male): This is The Alternative broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. There's a difference between inspiring words and authoritative ones. Today, Dr. Evans shows how scripture offers both: hope and encouragement backed by the full authority of God. Let's listen.

Dr. Tony Evans: Once the Supreme Court rules, all other viewpoints become irrelevant. What the Supreme Court is to the laws of our land, the Bible is the supreme authority of God's revelation in history. There is no higher appeal that you can appeal to than the Word of God.

I want to talk a bit about the authority of scripture. There are many ways we could go at it. I have chosen this one in John chapter 10 because it brings together a number of facets. I want to center in on one phrase that's located in verse 35. Jesus says, "If he called them gods," referring to a quote, I'm going to explain that in a moment, "to whom the Word of God came," and then he throws in a phrase that's kind of like just thrown in. He says, "and the scripture cannot be broken."

That phrase, "the scripture cannot be broken." Jesus says that the Bible, this word scripture is a reference to the Bible, cannot be abrogated or rendered void. What he says is the Bible is irrefragable. To be irrefragable means that it cannot be voided out. It cannot be overruled. It cannot be censored. It is, in fact, inerrant. It can't be abrogated.

Why? Because it's from God. It is a statement about the finality of divine authority. The Bible cannot be annulled. It doesn't matter whether you agree with it or disagree with it. It doesn't matter whether you like it or don't like it. What this means is, Jesus says, which is an important phrase of itself, that either we will receive the Bible as completely reliable and trustworthy on every matter that it records, affirms, and speaks, or else we will look at it simply as a collection of inspiring words.

Now, that distinction becomes very important. Many people believe the Bible to be words from God, but not the Word of God. Now, God does not simply want to give you inspiration from His Word. He wants you to experience the authority of His Word. Everybody who's ever tried to destroy it has been destroyed first. Every culture that has banned it, the culture's died before the Bible died.

That's because it can't be broken. In the same way as I said that referees are the final authority, they're only the final authority because they have a rule book that governs the game. So it is. The Bible is God's rule book, but it is also God's voice. It's a very important passage. Verse 30, Jesus is talking. He says, "I and My Father are what? Are one." He says, "God and I are one."

Verse 31, "And the Jews took up stones to stone Him." They loved to throw stones at Jesus. They picked up rocks to throw at Him. Jesus answered and said, "I showed you many good works from the Father. For which of them are you stoning Me? Why you want to hurt Me? What have I done to you? I've only done good things." The Jews answered, now watch this, this is very important, "For a good work we do not stone you. We're not stoning you because you've done bad things. But for blasphemy." Well, what did I say? "Because you, being a man, make yourself out to be God."

And they wanted to kill Him because Jesus was claiming a position and an authority that they said no man should be able to claim. And you're right, no man except the Son of Man should be able to claim it. And He claims and establishes His own divine authority. He does this throughout scripture. In Matthew 28:18, He says, "All authority is given to Me in heaven and on earth." He makes this claim to deity.

In fact, even in Matthew chapter nine, I'll just read it very quickly to you. Matthew chapter nine, Jesus says in verse two, He says to this man, "Your sins are forgiven." And the Jews said, "What?" Verse three, "And behold, some of the scribes said to Him, 'This fellow blasphemes.'" So Jesus says, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. You're upset because I said your sins are forgiven, but you weren't upset when I told him to get up and walk."

Jesus said, "It seemed to me, anybody who can say, 'You can get up and walk,' and that man gets up and walks, you should have no problem with him saying, 'Your sins are forgiven,' because you need to be divine to do both." So they were always calling Jesus a blasphemer because of His claim to divine authority. In fact, even in this chapter, John 10, look at what He says.

Verse 18, he says, "No one has taken My life from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. You can't kill Me unless I want to die. And I have authority to lay it down if I want to. And I have authority to take it up again if I want to. So you can't kill Me unless I decide to die today. And even if I decide to let you kill Me, which I'm going to do obviously for the purposes of the crucifixion, I will decide when I want to get up."

Now you ever tried that? "I decide when I'm going to lie down, die. I decide." "This commandment I received from the Father." "And there arose," I guess so, verse 19, "a division among the Jews because of these words. And many of them were saying, 'He has a demon. He's insane. Why do you listen to him? He crazy.'" So he could say he could die only when he chooses to die. He could rise when he wants to rise. This man forgives sins. This man does all these things. He just made a blind man see. And now he's really gone out there because now he says, "And I'm God."

They object to this statement, which leads him to this statement about the Bible: "The scripture cannot be broken." Because in their objection, he says, verse 34, "Has it not been written in your law, 'I said you are gods'? If he called them gods, to whom the Word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken, do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, 'You are blaspheming' because I say I am the Son of God?"

In other words, he's saying God even recognized human people who were operating under His law. He called them gods, small G. He said, "Now, if you're going to call human people who are only declaring the Word of God, you're going to give them a high status, how you going to belittle Me when I'm making blind people see?" But the point about the scripture is this: Jesus argues His authority as the Son of God using one word from the Old Testament, the word, the small G-O-D.

And says the scripture, it cannot be broken. It's authoritative. Now what's the point? Here it is. If you can't even break one word of scripture, in other words, if you can't even nullify one word, if you can't make one word disappear, if you can't make one word ineffective, if you can't make one word take away its potency, then what's true of one word must be true of all words. All of the Bible, since it goes down even to the words, cannot be broken. Then scripture cannot be broken.

Guest (Male): If not a single word of scripture can be undone, then its authority stands firm forever. And when Dr. Evans returns in a moment, we'll see how Jesus Himself affirmed that unshakable truth. First, though, I want to let you know that the message you're hearing today is part of Tony's powerful series, The Glory of God's Word. This 10-part audio collection explores the depth, authority, and life-transforming power of scripture.

And we'd like to send it to you as our way of saying thank you when you support the ministry of The Alternative. But that's not all. We're also including Tony's insightful book, The Power of Knowing God, which challenges us to move beyond simply knowing about God to pursuing a deeper, more personal relationship with Him. Together, these resources can help you understand God's truth more fully and put that truth to work in your life every day. Don't wait. This special double offer will only be available for a short time. Visit us right away at tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222 to request this package. That's tonyevans.org or 1-800-800-3222.

Guest (Female): Our faith can be tested by many things, like pain, loss, or even injustice. On the Unbound podcast, Dr. Tony Evans brings stories of true resilience to life.

Dr. Tony Evans: God knows what suffering is like. The God-man Himself knows it far more deeply than we ever will.

Guest (Female): You're not marrying a man, you're marrying a calling. Home is not four walls and a roof. Hope does not disappoint because of the Holy Spirit who's been poured out within us. Unbound with Dr. Tony Evans. Listen now.

Guest (Male): You can listen to the Unbound podcast wherever you hear your favorite podcast. Right now, let's get back to Dr. Evans.

Dr. Tony Evans: The Word of God will outlast you. You won't outlast this. And Jesus claims that the scripture bears His authority. Let me read to you a verse in Matthew, again. Matthew 24:35, "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away." So what God is saying is the Bible or scripture, what He says will outlast history. Well, I guess so, because it prophesies into eternity.

So scripture cannot be broken. Jesus makes a claim of authority. His claim of authority is that He bears deity. Therefore, if He has authority and the Bible is the Word of God, the Bible must possess His authority. How much authority does He have? All authority. So how much authority must His words have? All authority. Then how come we're not seeing His authority through His word? Because we're not taking His word as authority.

To reject the authority of scripture is to reject Christ. You can't love Jesus and not give deference to the authority of His word because His words have authority. They in fact have His authority. It's said often in the Gospels that Jesus spoke as one having authority and not like the scribes and the Pharisees. The scribes and the Pharisees had opinions. The scribes and the Pharisees had traditions. The scribes and the Pharisees had ideologies.

Jesus spoke as one having authority because He had authority. He didn't need to find out. He knew. What's my point? Here's my point. The Bible loses its authority in your experience. It doesn't lose its authority, but it loses its authority in your experience. It doesn't work, doesn't seem to work for you whenever it is, watch this, infused with human viewpoint. Can I say that one more time?

The Bible never loses its authority. It's always the Word of God. But you don't experience its authority. It doesn't work. Doesn't seem to work for you whenever it gets diluted with human viewpoint. Well, God is not looking for assistance. Everything He wanted said, He not only said, He preserved it. But the reason why the Spirit is not free to work His supernatural activity in our lives is He's dealing with diluted truth.

Do you remember the story, Second Kings 4, Elisha the prophet and there was a famine in the land and the people were hungry and even the leaders were hungry. And Elisha came and cooked some food. And then it says, and one of the guys went out to the field and found some wild cucumbers, wild gourds. But they didn't look wild to him. They looked like, oh, this will make the soup nice. And he put them in the stew.

And so everybody started eating the stew. And then it says, and they started throwing up. And they cried out, "There is death in the pot!" Because some guy thought he would help out what God had provided. And you wound up worse off. Do you know you can come to church and be worse off? You go to Bible study and be worse off. Because you don't know it, but you're putting cucumbers in the pot. And it's the cucumber of human opinion.

Whenever you go to anything that is an addition to what God says, you are diluting what God said and therefore diluting the experience of its authority in your life and thus delaying your victory. Because the Word of God is sure, settled in heaven. Opinions come a dime a dozen. You ever notice there's talk shows everywhere now? Good Lord. I didn't know people had that much to talk about. And it's really not that much. It's like the same things just done different ways.

Human viewpoint, babble by the hour. God can give you a bottom line quick. You want to have a one-hour discussion. Whenever you add to or take away from God's truth, you are diluting divine authority. There was an umpire in the old Negro baseball league named Bill Klem. Bill Klem was a big, huge guy. And one time, true story, the score was tied, was the bottom of the ninth, there was a man on third.

The batter hit the ball in the infield. It's the bottom of the ninth, so if this guy on third got in safe, then of course the home team would have won the game. So the ball was hit on the ground in the infield. The man on third blitzed home. He's running home hard as he could and he slid. He slid into home plate. It was real dusty, so dust flew everywhere. Catcher tried to tag him out. Catcher hit the ground too, and it was dust everywhere.

The home team came out of the dugout cheering, "Safe! Safe! Safe!" Of course, the visiting team ran out. "He's out! He's out! He's out!" And they're shouting. One team is shouting safe, the other team is shouting out. Bill Klem, he took off his face guard and threw it down and said, "Everybody shut up! Because he ain't nothing 'til I say what he is."

You got people on this side telling you to do this. You got folk on this side telling you to do that. You go, you don't know which side to go to. Everybody be quiet and let me tell you how it is. I am the bottom line. So in closing, what do we say? Take your Bible out of your spiritual museum. It's not impressive because you carry it. Or because you have it sitting in your car. Everybody have Bibles in their car, you ride with a Bible in your car, raise your hand. Raise your hand, tell the truth.

All right. Don't mean a thing. Or because you got four of them, one for each room. Or here's the one, here's the one, you have it sitting on the coffee table. Biblical authority means that the Bible possesses the right to supremely define your decision-making. That God has the right to make up the rules for your life. You know, when I was growing up, you know, what I did from the time I could get out of the house till the time the sun went down is play football.

That's all I wanted to do. Year round, no matter what other sport I was doing, I always made time to play football. But let me tell you something I always did. When it was like in the community, I brought the football. I brought the football. And the reason why, I wanted to quarterback. Okay? And I wasn't about to nobody tell me get on no line. No, I'm going to quarterback. Why? It's my ball.

God says, "I want to call the shots. I got the ball. This is My book. How do you call Me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not what I say?" Jesus, "How do you say hallelujah and do not what I say? How do you say praise the Lord and do not what I say? How do you say I'm a committed Christian and do not what I say? How you say I love the Lord, He heard my cry, and do not what I say?" God doesn't want your verbalization. He wants your response.

He wants you to do like you do when you're driving your car. You come up over that hill and you see the police car sitting on the side. That's authority sitting over there. But you act like it. You don't just say, "80 miles an hour. Oh, hey!" Your heart starts palpitating, you start perspiring, and you try to hit the brake, not too hard, because then it'll become obvious. You try to act like you've been slowing down all the time. That ain't nothing but fear. You know why? Because you've run into authority that you respect, so you respond.

In other words, the presence of authority creates a response, not an analysis. You know who doesn't respect police cars or police? Criminals. Are you a spiritual criminal? Moving right along, let's... that's who doesn't respect authority: criminals. In a word, the Bible is authoritative. It means what it says. It says what it means. And it works if you stop mixing it.

The problem is people only want the parts of the Bible that they like. They want sermons to tickle their ears. That's why Paul told Timothy, "Preach the word," because people are going to be looking to have their ears tickled because they don't want the truth, they want to feel good. It's nothing wrong with feeling good as long as truth is making you feel that way. But when a lie is making you feel good, then it's illegitimate.

We decorate it. We carry it. We acknowledge it. We open it. We read it. We talk to other people about it. It's got high position. It just has no authority because we don't allow it to veto anything in our lives. We don't allow it to vote on things we don't like. So we don't see its authority and we don't see its power. All we got is another religious book. You got the position. Talk to me about the authority.

Guest (Male): Dr. Tony Evans, reminding us that God's Word is meant to rule, carrying real authority in every part of our lives. Now, don't forget, the lesson we heard today comes from Tony's sermon series entitled The Glory of God's Word, a 10-message journey through the truth, power, and divine origin of scripture. It's a great way to strengthen your understanding of why the Bible matters and how it can transform your life.

And for a limited time, when you make a contribution to help support The Alternative broadcast ministry, we'll send you this complete audio collection as our gift, along with a special bonus: Tony's powerful book, The Power of Knowing God, designed to help you move from simply knowing about God to experiencing a deeper, more personal relationship with Him. This special package will only be offered for a few days, so visit tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222 soon to make the arrangements. Again, that's tonyevans.org or by phone at 1-800-800-3222.

There's no doubt that words hold power. They can leave a mark on us, for better or worse. Well, tomorrow Dr. Evans explains how God's Word goes even deeper, cutting through confusion to bring clarity and lasting change. Be sure to join us for this powerful look at the transforming truth of scripture.