God works where He works, not where we decide He is able to work. During the lifetimes of the 12 original apostles [Judas replaced in Acts 1] and the belated apostle Paul, there was no written NT available for believers. Did this mean that God was not already writing His Word on people's hearts? The written Bible is a useful tool but unopened and unread it will be like a hammer never removed from the tool box. It will never secure anything together by striking a nail.
So then strike down the teachings of the disciples of Christ who worked after the day of Pentecost in Acts 2 and prior to the availability of a written text. When the text became available it was a good thing, but without the Holy Spirit quickening the words in the hearts of men, it was dead... even as Jesus was dead hanging on the cross until he resurrected by the power of God.
Are they indeed? Or are they simply the dead carcass of Jesus awaiting the empowering of the Holy Spirit in someone who has consumed them?
"[God] Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life." II Cor 3:6
When I was growing up in a small town in central California, my mother always had a Bible laying open on the table in her living room. No one ever read that Bible in all of the years I lived there. I was the only one who attended a church anywhere during those years even though everyone in the house carried the label of Christian. How much Life did any of us receive from that always open, never read, Bible? None!
I agree that the writings were inspired by God. But, as I already said, remaining in an unopened, unread, Bible they remain dead like Jesus on the cross after he said, "It is finished" and before he was resurrected. The resurrection occurred through what power?
"But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth." Acts 1:8
And the promised Holy Ghost was first poured out in Acts chapter 2 with the power to resurrect in us the dead words which we had consumed from the carcass of Jesus, which we call the Bible. This is the beginning of the rebirth of which Jesus spoke here:
"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." John 3:3
We had all been dead, effectively born dead from our mother's wombs until we met the Master and received the quickening Spirit.
Yes, God is perfect and Jesus told us what?
"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Matt 5:48
Impossible? Did Jesus come for nothing?
"And they were astonished out of measure, saying among themselves, Who then can be saved?
And Jesus looking upon them saith, With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible." Mark 10:26-27
Yes, for God all things are possible and who is it that is in us working to perfect us?
"To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory: " Col 1:27
So then should we not now begin to understand that which a mystery?
amadeus,
I only have the time to pick up on a couple of your points.
Your presupposition about no NT during the life of the apostles meant that God was writing his Word on people's hearts, needs to be examined. We know from history that there was oral tradition that passed on the teachings of the apostles and early church. It is a danger to consider that 2 presumptions follow:
(1) Written traditions didn't happen until after a considerable amount of oral tradition. How did Luke begin his Gospel?
Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught (Luke 1:1-4 NIV, emphasis added).
While much of the 'handed down' material could have been oral, there is not an exclusion of that which is written being handed down. Who handed it down? Those who were eyewitnesses of the word!
There was more than enough information around between the death of the apostles and the complete written NT. The
Muratorian Fragment, dated AD 170-180, contains a list of 22 of the 27 books of the NT. A thorough scholarly investigation of the dating of NT books by John A T Robinson concluded that all books (with qualifications and alternatives) were written prior to the Fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 (Robinson 1976:352).
Earle Ellis argued for 'a considerable degree of probability for some written transmission of Gospel traditions from the time of Jesus' earthly ministry' (in Robinson 1976:346).
(2) A second presupposition that oral tradition was succeeded by written tradition, needs to be noted. That is the transmission of the written traditions were depended on, copied from other literary pieces, like Matthew depending on Mark. Robinson contends that 'there is every reason to think that both oral and literary processes went on concurrently for most of the first hundred years of the Christian church. The writing was earlier and the reign of the "living voice" longer than we have tended to suppose' (Robinson 1976:346).
You stated: 'During the lifetimes of the 12 original apostles [Judas replaced in Acts 1] and the belated apostle Paul, there was no written NT available for believers'. How do you know that? Luke depended on that which was 'handed down' to him from 'eyewitnesses' but there is no indication that it was all written tradition and no oral tradion - or vice versa.
Your view is that 'The written Bible is a useful tool but unopened and unread it will be like a hammer never removed from the tool box'. The Bible is a 'useful tool' when Scripture is clear that 'ALL Scripture is God-breathed' (2 Tim 3:16 NIV). Seems like your view is coming from your own mind, rather than directly from Scripture.
'When the text became available it was a good thing, but without the Holy Spirit quickening the words in the hearts of men, it was dead', is your perspective. The Bible says this of the NT writings of Paul:
'
15and regard the patience of our Lord
as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you,
16as also in all
his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as
they do also
the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction' (2 Pet 3:15-16 NIV, emphasis added).
Peter placed the Pauline letters among 'the rest of the Scriptures', i.e. Paul's writings were Scripture. What do we find in Paul's writings? 'You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts' (2 Cor 3:3 NIV).
I agree with you that human beings need to be quickened by the Holy Spirit in the human heart, but I learned that from Scripture, Paul's writing.
Oz
Works consulted
Robinson, J A T 1976.
Redating the New Testament. London: SCM Press Ltd.
