Parallels between the incarnation of Jesus and the nature of Scripture
| Error on Incarnation | Error on Scripture | Rev. 10 |
|---|---|---|
| Saying Jesus is two Persons (Failing to realize that the Divine Person of God the Son took to Himself a human nature, not a human Person) | Treating the Bible as have sections that are the Word of men and other sections that are the Word of God (contrary to 1 Thes. 2:13; 2 Pet 1:20-21; 2 Tim. 1:20-21; etc.) | Words already written on book before John writes them in his book (compare vv. 8-11 with Ezek. 2:2-4,7,9-10; 3:1-4,10,26-27) |
| Saying that Christ's human will could operate independentaly of His divine will | Saying that we need to distinguish what parts of the Bible are simply man's will and ideas and what portions are God's will and ideas. (For example, some feminists reject as "wrong" Paul's statements about women as not reflecting the divine will.) | Note exactly the same words that went into John came out of John as prophecy (compare vv. 8-11 with Ezek. 2:2-4,7,9-10; 3:1-4,10,26-27) |
| Saying that Jesus could have sinned (peccability) | Saying that Scripture has error. (The true faith has always maintained the inerrancy of all of Scripture.) | Symbols show the divine truthfulness of the book from heaven (vv. 1-6; see last sermon) |
| Saying that you can divide the human and divine natures (a Schizophreneic Jesus) | Saying that you can separate what is human from what is divine in the bible. | compare vv. 8-11 with Ezek. 2:2-4,7,9-10; 3:1-4,10,26-27 |
| Failing to distinguish between human and divine natures. | Failing to realize that the grammars, vocabularies and personalities of the authors do come through. | It is John who prophesies (vv. 10-11; see unique grammar of book) |
| Failing to realize that any resistance to Jesus is resistance to God, not simply man. | Denying infallibility to certain portions of Scripture. | Angel swears that what prophets have said is true (vv. 6-7) |
| Docetic heresy, which says that the human nature is illusion. | Treating the writers of Scripture as a dictation to passive scribes. | "you must" implies the prophet is not a robot (v. 11; cf. vv 9-10; Ezek. 2:6; 3:4-6,16-20 - warning that Ezekiel better prophecy |
| Nestorian heresy made Jesus a God-bearing man rather than the God-Man. | Barthians claim that the Bible contains the Word of God but deny that it is the Word of God in every letter. | Identical content of book from heaven and book that John writes (v. 4 with 7-11; Ezek. 2-3) |
| Apollinarian heresy denied that Jesus had a human spirit. | Failing to see the human emotion and spirit of the human prophets. | See other interactions with this "mighty angel" (5:4-5; 19:10; 22:8; cf. emotion of Ezekiel in Ezek 2-3) |
| The error of thinking that Jesus was a human person who had a divine infusion. | The error of thinking that Scripture is words of men that somehow have some divine extra added to them. | We see the opposite in vv. 7-11; Ezek. 2-3 |