Truth Magazine

By Joe Neil Clayton

We read in the New Testament that when Moses was about to make the Tabernacle, he was “warned” by God, who said; “See that you make all things according to the pattern that was showed you in the mount.” (Hebrews 8:5). Either God simply wanted to impress Moses with the importance of obedience, or else he had a larger purpose.

There was an order of worship planned for die Tabernacle, and this design had to fit the floor plan of the House itself, of course. But, God had other designs that demanded care in die building of the Tabernacle. These designs would span the centuries until Christ came to build His church.

As the Holy Spirit “moved” the writers of the New Testament to speak of the church, or of the system of religion that belonged to the age of Christ, they used the pattern of the Tabernacle to emphasize New Testaments truths. One of the larger of these truths is that the church is called the house of God, even as the Tabernacle was called the same. In Ex. 34:26, we learn that the Tabernacle was called the “house of Jehovah thy God.” The Apostle Paul uses the very similar expression “house of God” to refer to the “church of the living God, the pillar and Wound of the truth.” (I Tim. 3:15). Paul develops this truth into a statement packed with descriptive facts about the church, calling it the Temple, “A habitation of God in the Spirit.” (Eph. 2:19-22).

The New Testament writers also found ways (again. by the motivation of the Holy Spirit) to adapt the furnishings of the Tabernacle to New Testament concepts. In this way, the altar of burnt offerings is replaced by the cross, and the animal sacrifices by the body of Christ (Heb 13:10-15). As the altar of incense came to be connected with a time of prayer (Psalms 141:2, Luke 1:9-10), so the prayers of saints in New Testament language are connected with burning incense in a figurative way (Rev. 5:8, 8:3-4). The Laver of water is referred to in connection with cleansing (Heb. 10: 19-22), and the great veil of the Temple is said to be representative of the body of Christ, in the same passage.

The most significant ceremony involving the Tabernacle was the Atonement. Once a year the High Priest made a solemn journey into the room called the Most Holy Place, or the Holy of Holies. Since atonement is emphasized in the Old Testament as the most important of Tabernacle events, it follows that we should expect some New Testament fulfillment of the shad y Old Testament form.

First, we find that the writer of Hebrews demonstrates the significance of the single event with the words, “. . . the Holy Spirit this signifying that the way into the holy place has not yet been made manifest, while the firs tabernacle is yet standing.” (Heb. 9:8). God was not saving that he was letting the High Priest in, bat that he was keeping others out, according to this New Testament writer. Jus what was this place from which God excluded men while the first Tabernacle stood? It was the place which held the “mercy seat of God” (Heb. 9:3-5). However, the writer of Hebrews tells us that the figurative message of the Holy 4 Holies is that it represented Heaven (Heb. 9: 11-12, 24). Now, we see that the way into heaven was not “made manifest,” while the first Tabernacle stood. When the “more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands” appeared Christ as our High Priest of the New Covenant could enter and offer his “eternal” sacrifice. At the death of Christ, the veil of the Temple was rent in two from the top to the bottom (Mat. 27: 51). This meant that the writer of Hebrews could boldly announce that we could “enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh.” (Heb. 10: 19-20). The privilege to enter is a “hope both sure and steadfast and entering into that which is within the veil; whither as a forerunner Jesus entered for us, having become a high priest forever . . .” (Heb. 6:19-20).

When Paul says that God intended to “sum up all things in Christ,” we can add this lesson to the great heap of evidence in confirmation of this statement. It began with Moses, carefully following a pattern, so that the Holy Spirit could cause New Testament writers to tie their doctrine closely to that pattern. It all proves that God reigns, and that his revelations to two dispensations of time can be correlated completely. The side benefits come to us as evidence of the inspiration of the Bible, and in the glorification of the person of Christ.

Men should lift their eyes from the Tabernacles made with bands to the grand spiritual Temple of God which invites us to enter and share in the glories now revealed and seen clearly by faith. When men corrupt this beautiful spiritual vision with earthy concepts, they fail to receive the enticing vision of heaven that could serve to give them true hope.

TRUTH MAGAZINE, XVI: 44, pp. 10-11
September 14, 1972

By Ronald D. Howes

As a child at my mothers knee I was accustomed to repeating little nursery rhymes. All of us can remember the one where by a proper manipulation of the fingers we could say and do “here is the church, heres the steeple, open the doors and heres the people.” A similar recitation, a slightly altered finger manipulation, and you come up with an empty building. Most of us, however, grew out of the habit of learning doctrine by nursery rhyme, and have since dedicated ourselves to a study of the revealed will of God for authority in practice. It seems though that some have not.

On a recent trip through the states, it was our pleasure to meet with old friends of college days and visit brethren in different parts of the country. One of the congregations I used to visit on occasion while in school had outgrown their old building and had moved a couple of miles away, and finding them required some map work. Eventually though, we were successful and soon rolled up to a magnificent piece of contemporary architecture with a 30 foot steeple adorning the crest of its majestic roof.

I said to myself, “This must be the wrong address!” Certainly, we had run across an edifice of the Baptists, Methodists, or perhaps Mormon persuasion where steeples were a mark of the church, meaning in their terminology the building, not the people.

Much to my sorrow, the large florescent billboard out front read “The Church of Christ meets here.” The traditional meeting times were listed, and in the distance I could see people I had known to be members of the sought after congregation entering the building. Nervously clutching my Bible, I began to run over in my mind the laws of authority which govern the expenditure of the Lords treasury for church buildings. Not finding one for steeples, I crossed the foyer and took my seat with the faithful. Phrases and snatches from a sermon by an old soldier of the cross on “Looking like the nations around us” and “Playing the denominational game” and “Wasting the Lords money,” came to mind.

The building was a good example of the progress of the Lords church. The floors were richly carpeted, the pews thickly padded, and the windows adorned with simulated stained glass. This congregations pulpit was self adjusting, raising and lowering itself at the push of a button. There I sat in the middle of all that, thinking about primitive Christianity, when the sight of the hand-carved Lords Table caught my eye. During the evening lesson, my mind continually strayed from the topic, “The Simplicity of the N. T. Church,” to trying to figure out just bow many gospel preachers could have been supported in the Philippines or Nigeria with the foolish waste and strain for comfort that lay before my eyes. There were two months of preaching in the padding on my pew alone.

After the lesson one of the brethren, a deacon if I remember correctly tried to point out to me the scripturality of the scene. We traded verses on following apostolic example, abiding in the doctrine of Christ, and not adding to or subtracting from the word of the Lord. Needless to say, our discussion quickly resolved itself to expedients. Not finding justification for such a building there, I soon found that the preachers who bad brought me up on 2 Tim. 3:16, Jude 3, and 2 John 9 had missed a rule of authority: The Law of Aesthetics.

Since that dreary day preachers and others have justified their -steeples, spires, and monuments to me on the basis of this Law. They say, “It adds to the good looks and symmetry of the building,” and makes it look Uke a church, building. No doubt they visualize the hall of Tyrannus with a steeple also.

My shock has since passed to sorrow to think that brethren who had fought so long and hard for the New Testament order would court disaster with wanting to be like the people about them. Our meeting houses do not really have to look like cathedrals in order for us to assemble,

And now a confession, the building described arose from an over-active imagination. But, each part of it now exists on one of our meeting houses across the land. It should not be lour before someone gets it all together. Really makes you wonder, doesnt it?

TRUTH MAGAZINE, XVI: 44, p. 9
September 14, 1972

By Jeffery Kingry

I read recently in Parade magazine, a supplement that comes with the local paper, an article entitled, “More Abortions Than Babies in Eastern Europe.” In Budapest, Hungary for every ten new babies, there are fifteen dead babies by abortion. In Poland the rate is thirteen dead to every ten brought into the world. In Belgrade, Yugoslavia for every child born, there are four killed by abortion. Incredible as it may sound, in Yugoslavia some women have aborted over forty of their own children. Admittedly, the average in that country is four abortions per woman.

One woman doctor in Yugoslavia is reported as saying, “More and more young women are coming to the cities to work or study. Soon these 15- or 16-year olds find themselves pregnant. In the villages at their age they would probably get married. In the cities they seek an abortion. It costs somewhere between five and ten dollars.

Many brethren in the Lord who do not see anything “wrong” with killing a baby for the convenience of the mother would do well to consider these words and statistics. The U.S.S.R. had a liberal abortion program, but had to severely limit abortions in the past years because of their shrinking population. Some eastern European countries have had to start importing foreign labor, because they no longer have a youthful work force coming of age each year. Japan, who has long b-en plagued with overpopulation, still is overpopulated, but with no new generation coming up to carry on as the present population passes away. This fact has moved the Japanese to tighten up some of their liberal abortion laws.

The problem runs much deeper than self-genocide. Where has the conscience of man gone when he can, without a tear, destroy literally millions of lives daily with nary a ripple of protest from any quarter? A plane may crash, a building may burn, a natural disaster will take tens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of lives, and people will shake their heads with sadness. A small handful of innocent people can be murdered in their homes by the Manson cult, and the headlines wilt scream for months with the sordid details in shocked and indignant tones. But who hears the cries for the murdered innocents taken by men for convenience or expediency? “In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.”

The door for every imaginable horror was originally opened by Satan with a very small and effective wedge: a wedge called “indifference to truth.” How many times have we seen it? “How will the orphans be taken care of, if we do not build orphanages? Are you anti-orphan?” With that wedge in the door the rest comes marching through, and the identity of the church and its function are trampled under foot. Satan has those firmly in his grip.

“What is wrong with dancing? It is merely a pleasurable exercise. Are you against fun and exercise?” The door is cracked and through the gap oozes the real Pandoras horde; lasciviousness, lust, fornication, adultery heartache, and death.

“A war is no different than a policeman protecting an innocent person. You are a coward, afraid to fight for your country.” Satan laughs derisively at the arm-chair generals as he gathers in all the suffering, pillage, destruction, deceit, sickness, and lingering death from a thousand wars.

“All abortion cannot be wrong. You can not be sure that an unborn baby has a soul or is even human. What about the cases in which the mothers life is endangered?” The door bursts open, and soon more babies are dying than are being born. Satan cannot claim those innocent lives taken from their mothers wombs, cheated of their chance to see the day God has made, but, with a greedy smile he pulls in all those that murder with an M.D. It was just a little wedge… but look at the results. For a fact, Satan is a hungry lion seeking whom he might devour.

Today, some in America would “update” our antiquated” abortion laws. The result tomorrow might be that all the unwanted and unuseful might pay the same penalty. The law of the land is not the law of God, and government and its laws (and wars) do not absolve us of our responsibility to love and honor God, and the man that He made in His image.

“O Lord, thou God of vengeance, thou God of vengeance, shine forth!

Rise up, O judge of the earth; render to the proud their deserts!

O Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked exult?

They pour out their arrogant words, they boast all the evildoers.

They crush thy people, O Lord, and afflict thy heritage.

They slay the widow and the sojourner, and murder the fatherless; and they say, The Lord does not see;

The God of Jacob does not perceive.

Who rises up for me against the wicked?

Who stands up for me against the evildoers?

If the Lord had not been my help, my soul would soon have dwelt in the land of silence.

Can wicked rulers be allied with thee, who frame mischief by statute?

They band together against the life of the righteous, and condemn the innocent to death.

But the Lord has become my stronghold, and my God the rock of my refuge.

He will bring back on them their iniquity and wipe them out for their wickedness;

The Lord our God will wipe them out.”

(Psalms 94:1-7, 16, 17, 20-23)

TRUTH MAGAZINE, XVI: 44, pp. 7-8
September 14, 1972

By Mike Willis

Archaeology in General Corroboration of Background and in Dating Books

The assortments of names used in the New Testament were names common to that period of history. Through diggings which have excavated the ossuaries of the first century, scholars are able to find the common names of that time period. “The names of the deceased were invariably carved upon the ossuaries in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek, and these inscriptions have contributed materially to an understanding of contemporary family and social organization. Such names as Jesus (Jeshua), son of Joseph, Simon or Simeon, Judas, Ananias, Saphira, Elizabeth and many others indicate that the names in the New Testament were in fact the common names of the day.”1

Also, the format of the letters in the New Testament was the format generally used in the letters of that day. Compare Pauls introduction to that of contemporary letters:

“Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are at Ephesus…” 2

“Theon to Heraclides his brother, many greetings and wishes for good health.

“Tays to the lord Apollonius, many greetings.” 3

Thus, I have shown that the general background in the New Testament is accurately depicted as confirmed by the spade of the archaeologists.

Dating of Books

Textual critics harangued at one another regarding the dates which should be assigned for the writings of most of the books of the New Testament for years. The battle raged during the last part of the 19th century with many books being “definitely” assigned to the second century. The consensus of liberal scholarship was that the gospels were written in this order: Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John. John was definitely assigned a second century date and the rest of the gospels, at the most, a late first Century date.

“.. . in 1935 a fragment of the gospel of John was discovered and deciphered in the John Rylands Library of England which contained five verses of John (18:31-32 and 37, 38). This fragment dates from the first quarter of the second century, and since it was found in Egypt, it means that the original gospel of John would have been composed some time before 125 A.D. in order for it to have circulated that far. Sir Frederick Kenyon says concerning the traditional date of Johns gospel: There is no longer any reason to question the traditional date of the book.” 4

The effect of this find completely revamped liberal scholars thinking regarding the dates for the writings of the gospels. If John were written last and it was written in the first century, then all the gospels were written years earlier than originally suspected. Most scholars now date all die gospels before 70 A.D.

Other books of the New Testament have also been re-dated since new finds in archaeology show that the vocabularies used were common to that period and that apostasies similar to those described actually did exist at that time. Particularly, do these facts bear true for the writings of Paul.

Thus, archaeology has done much to establish approximate dates for the writings of the New Testament.

Footnotes

1. R. K. Harrison, Archaeology of the New Testament. New York: Association Press. 19641, p. 6.

2. Eph. 1:1.

3. Op. Cit. Harrison, p. 12.

4. Arlie. J. Hoover, External Evidences of Christianity, la mimeographed booklet published in Tampa, p. 132.

TRUTH MAGAZINE, XVI: 44, p. 6
September 14, 1972