OUT OF THE BOX

(This article is a repeat of an earlier post, and many of you have read it before. But it is a good follow-up to the previous post just below it. It continues our study on "Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth."  -Billy Long) “The Lord has given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him who is weary.”      Isaiah 50: 4 Icy Hot or Preparation-H Years ago a lady in my hometown was suffering from that “burning and itching sensation” that we hear about in TV commercials. She sent one of her children to the drugstore to purchase a tube of Preparation-H Ointment, which was placed in the tiny medicine cabinet above her bathroom sink along with other medicines which promise relief from various physical ailments. Soon afterwards, her hemorrhoids began to “flare up,” and the pain drove her back to the medicine cabinet for the relief she so desperately needed. Reaching for the Prep-H Ointment she inadvertently took the Icy Ho...

His word was good, but it seems to be his only word. I was listening to a very well-known TV preacher who was, in his usual way, giving a wonderful message about how God wants to bless His children, help them to succeed, and “be all they can be.” His message was good, but something troubled me about it.  Then I realized what bothered me. It was not that his word was bad, but rather that it was his only word. He seems to feed his flock one philosophical principle while omitting other important facets of God’s word. No one truth can be our foundation. Of course, the one foundation for the church is the Lordship of Jesus Christ. There is no other foundation. However, the whole Bible must be our foundation in determining our standards for belief and practice. We must not take one truth and lay it as the foundational principle upon which we set the Bible and all our philosophy. We err and open ourselves to distortion and even potential deception when we make any one doctrine or...