“And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which He commanded them not. 2. And there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them, and they died before the Lord.”
Nadab and Abihu are names that live in infamy in the Bible, Why? As sons of Aaron they had been given the priestly duty of offering sacrifices at the tabernacle, where God came among His people. They were playing around with their censers and offered sacrifices that had not been commanded by God, and they paid with their lives. I am using this text to show you that it does matter what we believe and what we do. They found out that God was serious about what He wanted them to do – being a priest for the people of God was not a game. It still matters what we believe about God and what we do for God. Let me give some examples. It matters what we believe about Jesus. The Old Testament in prophecy and the New Testament in prospect give us the picture of whom and what Jesus Christ was and is. We can’t make a picture of Jesus and decide that he will be “our Jesus” apart from what the Bible says about Him. It is clear from scripture that Jesus was the promised Messiah, and that He is the One chosen by God to save people from their sins. This was made known from the beginning when the angel announced to Joseph about Mary’s pregnancy: “And she (Mary) shall bring forth a son, and you shall call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins.”(Matthew 1:21) Jesus Himself declared: “I am the way, the truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father but by me.” (John 14:6) We can’t blithely call Jesus “just a good man,” because this is not how He is depicted in scripture. He is no less than the Son of God, God incarnate according to John 1:1-3: “In the beginning was the Word (Jesus), and the Word was with God, and the word was God. 2. The same was in the beginning with God. 3. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made.” There are many more biblical proofs about whom and what Jesus is, but what I have written should illustrate that according to the Bible, it does matter what we believe about Jesus. It matters what we believe about the Bible. Many today see the Bible as an ancient book of myths Ironically, they dismiss it as being too old to be relevant. Why, then, will the same people believe in accounts of dinosaurs. Shoot, that was a long time ago, and it shouldn’t matter to us. The Bible is ever old and ever new. I think that it was Karl Barth who said that you can have the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other and see what God is doing in the world. The Bible is the accurate, perfect revelation of God and of His plans for the world. We can’t neglect the Bible and lead the kind of lives that God wants us to lead. It is apparent that there is vast ignorance of the Bible in our world today. I have read many accounts of people who started reading the Bible to prove that it was a book of myths and came away from it firmly convinced of the Bible’s reality. That’s not true of everyone who read it, of course, but if it is true about one person that is enough to declare the Bible the word of God. We can’t go through the bible as if it is a buffet and pick and choose what we want. The Bible has a clear message of God’s love for us demonstrated in Jesus Christ. It has a clear message of God’s hatred of sin, and of His judgment. We can’t have only a God of love, or only a God of judgment. According the Bible, God is all that He is, and we should believe it. Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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