Hermeneutics

Newsletter article for December 2004

© 2004 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

“There is no God.”

“I am a god.”

“God is tempting me.”

“Jesus be cursed.”

This may seem like a foolish question, but which of these phrases comes from the Bible? The quick and easy answer is that they all are found in the Bible, but the true answer is that in this form they are all taken out of context. Here are these same verses in their proper context:

“The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” (Psalm 14:1)

“Will you then say, ‘I am a god,’ in the presence of those who kill you? You will be but a man, not a god, in the hands of those who slay you.” (Ezekiel 28:9)

“When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers.” (James 1:13-16)

“No one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus be cursed,’ and no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.” (I Corinthians 12:3)

Hermeneutics is the study of the interpretation of texts such as the Holy Scriptures. As I have demonstrated above the proper interpretation is essential if a person is going to properly understand what the Bible has to teach. Otherwise if we have a false method of interpreting the Bible we can even make God’s Word say what we want it to say, despite what it really says.

Jesus calls the devil the “father of lies” (John 8:44) but even the devil lies in a sneaky way so that he makes his deadly lies seem attractive and true. When the devil was tempting Jesus (see Luke 4 or Matt. 4) he quoted Psalm 91:11-12 which reads, “He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” What the devil was trying to do was to get Jesus to commit suicide by jumping off of a tall building. His wicked reasoning went like this: “If God promised to protect you then you can’t be hurt, so make him prove it by jumping.” Jesus was not convinced by this fallacious argument. First of all, Jesus believed the teaching from Psalm 91 so he didn’t need to prove that God would save him. He already knew it by faith. Also, Jesus knew better than to say, “Well, if the Bible says it then it must be true.” Jesus knew the Bible better than that. He answered the devil by quoting another Bible verse which says “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” (Deut. 6:16) This demonstrates the hermeneutical principle which states, “Let Scripture interpret Scripture.” All scripture is true because it is God’s Word (2 Tim. 3:16) so just because one passage is accepted as true it doesn’t mean that you can reject another.

We saw this type of false hermeneutic at St. Timothy earlier this year when an unknown and still-unrepentant person made reference to Exodus 32:18 in a newsletter article which gave the false argument that because God wants us to sing then all singing must be God-pleasing. Well, anyone who is familiar with the story of Exodus 32 knows that God was not pleased with this singing, and He was so angry over their false praise that he was ready to destroy all the people of Israel (see v. 10) and start over with Moses. So just because singing is one way to properly praise God, it doesn’t mean that all singing properly praises God.

I have also heard someone try to tell me this year that because Scripture says to “Sing for joy to the Lord” (Ps. 95) it is all right to commit the idolatry of self-worship. Well, not exactly in those words, but that was the obvious intent of the argument in the same way that Satan also tried to tempt Jesus to disobey God by his misuse of Psalm 91. I was not swayed by this misuse of God’s Word, but I am extremely concerned that some people around here are misusing God’s Word in just such a way, and that other people are possibly being misled by such lies.

Hermeneutics by themselves are not pro-Christian or anti-Christian. They are tools which may help Christians understand God’s Word so that through it they may believe in Jesus and receive His salvation. A proper interpretation of God’s Word shows us Christ as our savior. An improper interpretation shows us something else which cannot save us. It is the great strength of Lutheran theology that we have the proper tools to understand the Scriptures “which are able to make you wise unto salvation” (2 Tim. 3:15), but even the best theology and the best teaching will do no good if we don’t use them, or don’t believe the truth of God’s Word. “Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers.” (James 1:16)