I heard a long time ago that: ALL SCRIPTURE HAS ONE INTERPRETATION, BUT MANY APPLICATIONS. However, we use the scriptures as if we have the one and only interpretation. I am sure in many cases we do, but how many times do we just have one application? I look forward to the day where we will have the entire understanding of the Scriptures. I am appreciative of the truth that we have. We all stand on what we have heard and what we have studied out for ourselves. What a statement John made in 1John 1:1 “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life”!
What was it like to have actually heard Jesus speak, and to have seen him for ourselves and not another? To have had the opportunity to ask him a question if we didn’t understand what he just said? To have been able to look at him as he spoke, to see his gestures, his body language, his emotions as he spoke? How powerful that would have been, to have been able to touch him! No wonder the men who wrote the Bible spoke with so great authority!
We get so excited preaching messages about the experiences of the men and women of that day, can you imagine how the air was charged when he actually said: BLESSED ARE THE POOR IN SPIRIT: FOR THEIRS IS THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN? What did it feel like that day on the hillside to have seen, heard and touched the KING OF KINGS?
How could you question a man who had seen, heard and touched the master? We read the Bible and see how men disregarded the words of Paul, Peter, John and even Jesus himself. How could one do that? It is simple to understand: they had no vision. It becomes clearer everyday what Solomon meant in Pro. 29:18, “Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.”
We are living in a time where a vision is so needful. We have not seen, heard and touched him, so it is hard to convince people today. If you don’t have a vision, you will not adhere to a minister. If people didn’t listen to the ones who had seen, heard and touched, how can we expect them to listen today? Well, they won’t unless they have a vision and realize that it takes a ministry today to show the way to life.
It is so sad to see the way the religious world is going today. There is so much theatrics in churches today that it is like a Hollywood production. The messages are planned out in advance. Organizations have become so organized. The children of God today have been given strong drink and are delusional. Babylon has mixed a strong drink and people are drinking it today.
In the Body of Christ we must make sure that we mix things properly for the people of God. A pharmacist goes to school many years to learn how to properly mix drugs for medicine. One slip of too much of one ingredient will be hazardous to the individual taking it. Paul said in 2Ti 2:15 “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth”. We must rightly divide the word of truth. This is why Babylon is drunk today; its leaders have not mixed the proper amount of truth with the Spirit.
We must be careful ourselves to always give the proper diet in each service. We can be over balanced with not enough of the Spirit or not enough of the Word. It takes a skillful pharmacist (minister) to properly mix the service. There are preachers as well as saints that don’t know how to mix a service. Some people rise and all they are interested in is giving what they feel.
We have a beautiful Bible story of an incident like this in 2Kings 4:38-44. If there had not been a skilled man of God there that day, all the prophets would have died with food poisoning.
I appreciate the men who work with me in Lakeland and Orlando, who are willing to learn how to entertain the Spirit of the Lord. There is a training we must go through in order to learn how to be an effective minister. Too many men today in the ministry are not having the effect they should on their congregations. We look forward to the day where our testimony will be that we have heard, seen and felt of him.
Robert Walker
Pastor of Gospel Assembly of Central Florida
Overseer of Orlando Gospel Assembly