That is Completely UN Scriptural

Is it really just a big ol’ bear hug of love? Laying on the hands that is? They say that touch has healing powers. Mmmm… makes me wonder.

The Voyager probe is probably somewhere out there in the Oort cloud by now. Do you remember the Voyager probe? They referred to it in Star Trek I. Not a Trek fan?

Well what does this have to do with scripture? It is a passing thought that I had. Let’s consider a satellite or say a space probe 100 gajillion miles out there in outer space somewhere. NASA needs to be able to send and receive messages to this space probe right? Well sending may not be a big deal. After all, we can just build bigger beefier transmitters I suppose. Wait a second. Isn’t there a point to which the signal will eventually degrade to the noise floor? You know, that point at which a radio station starts to get staticy? That’s when the noise similar to what may show up on a television with no antenna has the same amount of power as the signal and it sounds all static. Well, this concept is not all that different in interstellar communications. Information gets sent and eventually after about 10000000 light years or something the signal may fade in strength or have a few static pulses in there that overwrite what was actually sent. Instead of a thrustre firing away from Saturn, suddenly the Voyager probe goes crashing into Saturn’s rings and we have the Solar System Protection Agency on our hands.

Well anyway, those clever communications scientists devised a way to encode extra “recovery” information into the signal. That is, the signal can be rebuilt from itself. Sort of like sending spare parts in the signal. If one of the parts gets broken, you can use the rest of the parts to reconstruct the signal. Make sense? If not, go study parity on wikipedia.

This is the question I have in my mind. We know that there are tons of variations in the manuscripts that form our modern Bibles. No biggie. They say that  they are 95-96% in agreement. Okay, that works great for most stuff – but sometimes there are big questions  – for example the Great Commission. There are those who say that the Great Commission  was actually a scribal interpolation or something like that (scribe adding something to a manuscript to support their own pet doctrine).

So my question really comes back to integrity of the scriptures. I suspect that God in His infinite wisdom would have perhaps built in “parity” into the scriptures. Taken from what we call the Old Testament, this would refer to the whole idea of two or three witnesses to confirm a fact. Look it up. It is somewhere in the law.

Had an interesting thought pop into my head yesterday  evening.
The Ark of the Covenant had a mercy seat on top, under which sat the stone tablets of the law. The Mosaic Covenant written into the stone tablets. Don’t do all of these things. The Renewed Covenant…. seems to focus quite a bit on forgiveness.

A thought came to me…. the Renewed Covenant may sit on top of the new Old Covenant (the law). Forgiveness over Law. Seems to be consistent with most of Jesus’ message.

King David got busted up by the prophet Nathan for adultery with Bethsheba. Nathan said something like hey there is this guy who stole some farmer’s last ewe. David responds – the farmer should pay back four fold and give up his life. That was the same justice that was delivered to David. 4 of his kids wound up dying. He didn’t have to give up his life though. What’s up with that? As King, He did repent and appealed to a higher authority, namely YHWH.

This pattern seems to be consistent with a lot of Jesus’ message. Focus on yourself before running around pointing out sin in everyone else’s life – be forgiving, etc.  At the same time though, if your brother… key word .. brother .. meaning you have a relationship with the person that is sinning, then go to him and help him in the right direction if you can. If he won’t listen, then take another brother. If still, then take the entire assembly. If still, then cast Him out. Let the devil deal with him so that he may be saved.

John 18:1 Having said these things, Jesus, went out, with his disciples, across the winter-torrent of the Kedron, where was a garden,—into which he entered, he, and his disciples.
Joh 18:2 Now, Judas also, who was delivering him up, knew the place: because, oft, had Jesus been gathered there, with his disciples.
Joh 18:3 Judas, therefore, receiving the band, and officers, from among the High-priests and from among the Pharisees, cometh thither, with lights and torches and weapons.
Joh 18:4 Jesus, therefore, knowing all the things coming upon him, went forth, and saith unto them—Whom, seek ye?
Joh 18:5 They answered him—Jesus, the Nazarene. He saith unto them—I, am he. Now Judas also, who was delivering him up, was standing with them.
Joh 18:6 When, therefore, he said unto them, I, am he, they went backwards, and fell to the ground.
Joh 18:7 Again, therefore, he questioned them—Whom, seek ye? And, they, said—Jesus, the Nazarene.

He said I AM and they fell to the ground. The he is not there in the Greek as far as I can tell.

I AM.