 Because if you believe something it doesn't say, you have missed what it does say. So while believing what it doesn't say, you don't believe what it does say. What are hermeneutics? How important are hermeneutics? Well, the fact that we don't discuss it much, the fact that a lot of Christians don't understand what it is and how necessary it is, that lets us know how serious the problem is that we've encountered in church. What hermeneutics is, it can be an art or a science as it relates to interpretation. It's the methodology that we would use now. The problem is though that many people, their hermeneutics is an art and not a science. The word hermeneutics comes from the Greek word hermeneus. Matter of fact, we see it in a couple of verses in the Bible. One in particular, I probably think that many people don't even recognize that it's there. It'll kind of help you understand what it means. 1 Corinthians 14-13, therefore, let one who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. And the word that's used there is the Greek word hermeneus. It's actually dea, hermeneus, which the two words combine, but it's hermeneus, which is to explain. The point of interpretation is to give some sort of explanation when we understand something, that is what God wants us to do. As a matter of fact, we see this also comes up when Paul and Barnabas are out and they're performing miracles and the people thought they were two gods, Zeus and Hermes. They thought that Paul was the one who was Hermes. Why? Because he was the one that was doing the speaking. And so when we think about hermeneutics, hermeneutics is just really the methodology that we employ when it comes to interpreting passages. Now, how important are hermeneutics? Well, I like how John MacArthur puts it. The importance of careful biblical interpretation couldn't be overstated. It's impossible to overstate it. Misinterpreting the Bible, listen, is essentially no better than not believing it. Now, he comes up with the conclusion that it's no better than not reading it all. And some might think that's a little bit overstressing, but I don't think so. Why? Well, let's also listen to his explanation as to why he says so. Because if you believe something it doesn't say, you have missed what it does say. So while believing what it doesn't say, you don't believe what it does say. It would do no good to have the Bible and not to know what it says. It would do no good to read the Bible and then what it says, you see something totally different. In other words, when someone says this, you think you were interpreted as it being that. Something totally different. And so it actually did no good for you to even have the Bible. That's his point. And so if you're not going to take what it says, then you shouldn't take it at all. That's the point. And today we see a lot of that happening. As a matter of fact, there is a clear warning all throughout the scriptures. As a matter of fact, Paul brings this up in 1 Corinthians 4-6. He says, Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively applied to myself and to Paul's for your sake, so that in us, you may learn not to exceed what is written so that none of you will become arrogant against one another. His point is, do not exceed what's in the scripture. You need to know what's in the scripture. Don't go outside of that. And that is a problem. Now it's not just a problem with one particular group, although one particular group of Christians tends to have a stronghold on this misuse that is going outside of scripture that is interpreting the Bible in light of their experiences versus interpreting their experiences in light of the Bible. We'll talk about that in a second, but this happens all across the board. You must develop a way, you must develop a methodology, you must develop a hermeneutic. What is a hermeneutic? It's how you read or interpret the Bible. Now, I want to tell you what mine is. And mine happens to be yours for 99% of whatever you do in life. It's just a fact. It's a normal way of reading. As a matter of fact, it's often been called that. Mine is a dispensational hermeneutic. Not to mean that you have to be dispensational, no, no, but the dispensational hermeneutic is simply a literal grammatical historical hermeneutic, meaning that I read the Bible in the plain understanding, just at face value what it says. And so I take into account, I want to read it as literally as possible. Not woodenly as possible, no. That means that if you read it literally, just like everything else, you understand that there are idioms, that there are metaphors, there are figures or speeches. And so you also apply that. As a matter of fact, oftentimes you see that in many cases the Bible will even let you know ahead of time that it's speaking figuratively. And so that takes into account, just like when we read anything else, we want to read it as literally as possible until we cannot read it. If it doesn't make sense literally, then we don't read it literally. So when it talks about speaking to God face to face, well, we know that God can have a face and have two eyes, two ears, lips and a nose, no. But the word that's used there in the Hebrew is alpane, which is before in front of. And so we understand that so when it says before his face or in front of him or face to face, we know what is being stated. Obviously, that's not literally. And then there's the grammatical aspect of it, words have meanings. And so if we're reading it in Hebrew or in Greek or make what does the word mean? What is the mood? What is the voice? What is the tense? What is the case? Is this a noun? Is this is this noun the subject? Is this noun a predicate? Is this a participle? Is this case in the genitive? Is it in the dative? Is it the accusive? Is it direct object or the indirect object? Is it in the middle voice, the passive voice? Is it subjunctive? Is it indicative? All these things matter. And so that's where the grammatical portion comes in. We do the exact same thing. If I say that I want you to do something, well, the question is what you am I speaking of? But if I can see that it's plural or if it's singular, that helps to understand if I use something in the past tense or in the future tense, that also helps to understand what I'm saying. Why? Because when I speak to you or when anyone speaks, you're trying to convey a message and no one who speaks doesn't want the person that's listening to understand the intent, the intent of the author or the intent of the speaker. You want people to understand what you're saying. You're not trying to confuse anyone. Why is that important? Because there's never been a society in the history of the world that has communicated in idioms, that has communicated in metaphors, that's communicated in poetry. There's never been a society that way. Every society has been a plain language speaking people for you to take at face value, literally what they say, until they give you a reason not to. That's the way that we understand everything. And then the last part of this, this literal grammatical historical hermetic is that I understand things kind of in its chronology, the same way you do, if I'm baking something, there's a chronology to the directions to it. I do this, then I do that, then I do that. So when the Bible is speaking and we get someplace that the Bible has spoken of in the past, I understand that it's simply a fulfillment of what's been spoken of. And so when we take God's prophecies, for example, his prophecies, they understood it, they were spoken of and understood it to be literal. And then in the Old Testament, every fulfillment of the prophecy was fulfilled literally. And so what should the expectation to be of any unfulfilled prophecy left to be fulfilled? That it should be fulfilled literally. What can happen in many cases that people will read something kind of in the text, their own feelings, their own philosophies, not really getting it. They may have read it, they may have understood it, but they actually didn't really read it, didn't study it. Understand what he's saying instead of what you think or what you feel. Jesus brings us up a little bit when he's speaking to Nicodemus and John 3. Jesus is saying that you must be born again and Jesus kind of rebukes Nicodemus because he doesn't know something. He says you, verse 10 in chapter three, he says you, a teacher of Israel, and you don't understand these things, you don't know these things. Well, why would Jesus make that statement? Because it's already been written. The fact of the matter is, God is not trying to confuse us. And so he puts it in writing for us to go back and to understand and to learn of it. And if God says something, he intends or he certainly means what he says. And so he's on Nicodemus because Nicodemus, this was been written. This whole idea of being born again, the whole idea of your heart being regenerated, the whole idea of God putting his spirit in your heart and causing you to follow and obey him and never to depart, that was what was prophesied previously. And there should not be a reason why a teacher not know these things. And so Jesus says, you, a teacher of Israel don't know these things. Unfortunately, not only do we have people, but we have pastors, teachers who do not study correctly. That's why Paul is telling Timothy in 2 Timothy 2.15, he says, be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed. What does it look like he says? Accurately handling the word of truth. All of these scriptures, as he tells them later, they have been given for us. They've been God-breed. Why? So that we can be equipped, not lack anything for our edification, for our teaching, for growing all of these things. The purpose of the word is to grow us. But how you read it absolutely matters. There are those that would give vague terms to describe their hermeneutics such as Christ-centered or Christ-centric. Well, what does that mean? I can say that mine is Christ-centric, but that doesn't explain what it means. How do you read it? How do I read something if I'm reading a passage and I say it's Christ-centered? What does that mean? Well, now it becomes so subjective that anyone can interpret what Christ-centered means. So such as mine, the literal grammatical historical hermeneutic, you understand, here's how these are applied, literally, grammatically, historically. And so it works even when we come to poetry, even when we come to the apocalypse. All of those different things are entailed in that. It gives me a guide. That means I'm gonna come to the same conclusion, but you can at least see how we're getting there. Oh, by the way, you do the exact same thing when you read a menu, when you read a regular novel, when you read a newspaper, a magazine, when you read directions, and 90% of how you read the Bible, you read it the exact same where the problem is. It comes in when we start interpreting our own doctrine, our own philosophy, and worst of all, our own feelings into the text. John MacArthur is always gonna be one who has a problem with the charismatic woman. I do too. And he recognized that poor hermeneutics is a problem in the charismatic movement. Poor principles of hermeneutics show up in this movement everywhere, as they do in other movements. Let me quote from a very astute writer by the name of Gordon Fee. Gordon Fee is a seminary professor with a terminal degree. He's a very brilliant man. And interestingly enough, Gordon Fee is a Pentecostal. And listen to what he says about the Pentecostals and Charismatics with regard to Bible interpretation, I quote. Now this is important because Gordon Fee is a scholar or was a scholar, and he is or was a Pentecostal, which makes sense. It helps if someone who happens to be a Pentecostal, charismatic breaks down what people who believe like him, similarly what their mistakes are. And note what he's saying as John MacArthur is reading a quote from Gordon Fee. Pentecostals, in spite of some of their excesses, are frequently praised for recapturing for the church her joyful radiance, missionary enthusiasm, and life in the Spirit. But they are at the same time noted for bad hermeneutics. First, their attitude toward Scripture regularly has included a general disregard for scientific exegesis and carefully thought out hermeneutics. In fact, hermeneutics has simply not been a Pentecostal thing. Could you agree that or would you, or would you agree that strong hermeneutics, biblical interpretation has not really been a thing? Think about some of the scholars that you can think of, and you're gonna find that not a lot of them happen to be charismatic Pentecostal. Now there are some, I'm not trying to say there are not, but in many cases, the average Pentecostal person that you come in contact with, when you talk about how we read the Bible, they might turn around and counter with how you're relying on head knowledge and not the Spirit. You're relying on what you know versus following the Spirit. However, as we know by the Scriptures, who gave us the Scriptures? So when someone says that, you understand that's the person that's not reading the Scriptures like they're supposed to. That's the person that doesn't fully understand that's the person that would rather read their emotions or their feelings or what they think into the Scriptures versus the other way around. Scripture is the Word of God and is to be obeyed. In place of scientific hermeneutics, they're developed a kind of pragmatic hermeneutics. Obey what is taken literally because it's obvious, spiritualize, allegorize, or devotionalize the rest. And then he says, secondly, it is probably fair and important to note that in general, the Pentecostal's experience has preceded their hermeneutics. In a sense, the Pentecostal tends to exegete his experience. And that happens a lot. And by the way, it's not just Pentecostals, even though he's focused on Pentecostals at that moment, it's not just Pentecostals. I've seen Southern Baptist, I've seen Presbyterian, I've seen a lot of different people who will take their own doctrine or theological background or belief and read it into the Scriptures. Whereas in one sense, you might see someone who will see that numbers matter. So when we give the creation account, how many days was the earth created? Well, in six days. Why? Because it literally says six days. But then by the same token, how many years will this thousand year reign, this millennial reign be? Well, we're not sure because a thousand doesn't mean a thousand. Well, where do we get that from? And that's the problem. Understanding that if words and numbers and letters don't mean anything until they mean something to you, that's a problem because now you become the arbiter of interpretation. Everything becomes subjective, and depending upon who is the smartest, who's the best at equipping, who's the best at speaking, then that will become the dominant understanding. And that should never be the case. Think about how the church for many of its years was ruled and governed by Catholic thought because they control many of the ways people thought or what got out. The fact of the matter is what the Bible or what the writer or speaker intends to say is how we ought to take it, not reading into what we think it's going to be. Oftentimes we end up spiritualizing the text because maybe I've been thinking about something and now I see that in the text. What it means to me and what it means to you should be exactly what it meant to the person that was writing it and the people that it was intended for. Where you have a deviation from sound doctrine, inevitably you have a failure to stay by the science of hermeneutics, or you have a flat-out denial of the veracity and authenticity of the text itself. But in the case where somebody affirms the text, heresy happens because while affirming the text, you misinterpret the text. Now if a person doesn't have the same sort of hermeneutic that I have, that's fine. I would encourage you to develop your own, to make sure that you understand what it is and to be consistent. If your hermeneutic is inconsistent, then you don't have a hermeneutic. What you have is an opinion that you are placing on the text. And so my friends, this is that important. Again, this is why Paul says, teach what a course would sound doctrine, sound teaching. Why? Because it goes on to say later on in another book that many will not endure sound doctrine. They'll have itching ears, itching hearts, everything itching and they'll want it to be scratch and tickle. So they will find someone who will teach and preach exactly what they want to hear. And it's not just Pentecostals and Charismatic. It's also those who are more conservative. It can be someone who's a Calvinist, someone who's an Arminian, someone who's dispensational. It doesn't matter who you are, but if you want to hear what you want to hear rather than what the text says, you're going to find somebody to tell you or preach to you how you want it to be done. But what you really want to do is be able to read the scriptures for yourself. That's how you can test and see if what God says, if what they say is so, just like the Bereans did to Paul. In other words, please make it your sincere desire to know what your hermeneutic is and to be consistent as you read the scriptures. Because the scriptures are the one thing that all of us have in equal measure. I have no more of the Bible than you do. We can fight about and argue who has more Holy Spirit, who's led by the Spirit more. But what we do all have in common is the exact same number of books, the same number of words, the same authors. And so let's use what he gave us evenly and be guilty of being consistent with how we read it and being faithful to the text and not violating what Paul says about going outside or exceeding what the text says. Amen.