The Bible isn't the word of God. It contains the word of God

CARM ^ | 07/21/2014 | Matt Slick

[SeekAndFind]

by Matt Slick

One of the objections raised by critics of biblical inspiration is that the Bible is not the word of God, but that it contains the word of God.  Is this accurate?  No.  First of all, this doesn't fit what the Bible says about itself.  The collection of 66 books that the Christian Church recognized as being inspired speaks as the very words of God in many places.

1. "Thus says the Lord" occurs over 400 times in the Old Testament.
2. "God said" occurs 42 times in the Old Testament and four times in the New Testament.
3. "God spoke" occurs 9 times in the Old Testament and 3 times in the New Testament.
4. "The Spirit of the Lord spoke" through people in 2 Sam. 23:2; 1 Kings 22:24; 2 Chron. 20:14.

Of course, the errantists (those who say the Bible in its original documents had errors) will reject these scriptures' accuracy; that is, they will deny that God's word is without error--even in the originals.

If appealing to the Bible in a general sense isn't good enough.  Let's consider that Jesus said the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms (all of the Old Testament) were Scripture, and that the Scriptures cannot be broken--cannot fail (John 10:35).

Some might say that there are instances of verses that "contain" God's word, but that it doesn't mean the Bible is God's word.  The problem is addressed by Jesus.

Luke 24:44-45, "Now He said to them, 'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures."

Notice that Jesus speaks about what is written regarding him in the Old Testament.  Then Luke writes that Jesus opened their mind to understand the Scriptures.  What Scriptures?  The Law (Moses), the Prophets, and the Psalms.  This was a common designation for the Old Testament.  Therefore, Jesus says that the written form of the Old Testament is Scripture.  Jesus goes on to deal with the religious leaders who would violate these Scriptures which he called "the word of God."

• Matt 15:6, "he is not to honor his father or his mother. And thus you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition."
• Mark 7:13, "thus invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and you do many things such as that.”
• John 10:35 “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken)."

Jesus never said the scriptures contain the word of God.  He said they were the word of God.  Therefore, we can see that the word of God is the written form of Scripture.  In fact, we are told by Paul not to exceed what is written.  Note, Paul doesn't say to not exceed the parts of the scripture that contain God's word; he says not to exceed what is written!

1 Cor. 4:6, "Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively applied to myself and Apollos for your sakes, that in us you might learn not to exceed what is written, in order that no one of you might become arrogant in behalf of one against the other."

It is the written form that is proclaimed as being Scripture, unbreakable, the word of God, and the standard of which we are not to exceed.  This can only be true if the written form is the Word of God and not just something that subjectively contains the word of God.

What does it mean to be the Word of God?

The Bible is full of citations where it quotes God.  However, it also has citations of non-inspired individuals, such as Judas, Herod, etc. Satan, for example, lied when addressing Eve in The Garden of Eden.  This means that the Bible contains a record of a lie.  But how can such an error be included in the Word of God and still have the word of God be inerrant since a lie is an error?

The answer is that the Bible inerrantly records the lie.  It makes no mistakes in its reporting of events, in its proclamation of truth, and in its revelation of God's will.  Where it may record the lies, failures, deception, etc., of various individuals, it does so perfectly and without error.  Likewise, when it records historical events, genealogies, etc., it does so using the idioms and cultural norms of the time--yet it is without error.

Jesus acknowledged this when he said that the Word of God, the Scripture, cannot be broken.  This means that it cannot fail.  Why? because the written form of the word of God, which is Scripture, is inspired; and because it is inspired, it cannot fail; it must be fulfilled. Remember, Jesus called the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms (all of the Old Testament) Scripture; and he says that the Scriptures cannot be broken--cannot fail.  He was obviously referring to the written form of the Old Testament:

• Luke 24:44-45, "Now He said to them, 'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures."
• John 10:35 “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken)."

If a citation of a city was incorrect, is that not a failure of Scripture?  If a date is wrong, is that not a failure of scripture?  Likewise, would not an error in a fact likewise be a failure in the Scripture?  Of course it would!  But Jesus says the Scriptures cannot be broken.  They cannot fail.  Is Jesus wrong?

Is the New Testament also Scripture?

It should go without saying that the New Testament is also Scripture.  The early church recognized the New Testament documents as being authentic and inspired and included them in the canon of Scripture along with the Old Testament.  In fact, Paul recognized the authority that his words had in the church.  Take for example what he said to the Colossians.

Col. 4:16, "And when this letter is read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and you, for your part read my letter that is coming from Laodicea.^"1

Likewise, Peter made an interesting comment about Paul's writings when he said,

"as 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. 3:16).

Peter called Paul's writings Scripture.  In turn, Paul called Scriptures "God-breathed," and Jesus said the Scriptures cannot fail.

Scripture is God-breathed

2 Tim. 3:16-17 says, "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; ¹⁷ that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work." The word "inspired" is literally "God-breathed."  This is an interesting phrase since it implies that the Scriptures are from the mouth of God.

Likewise, Peter says in 2 Pet. 1:21, "for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God."  Notice that Peter is stating that prophecy is not the product of human will.  Instead, prophecy occurs by those moved by the Holy Spirit.

God spoke through the mouth of the prophets.  We see in Acts 3:18, "But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ should suffer, He has thus fulfilled."  Clearly, Luke, the writer of Acts, understood the Old Testament Scriptures to be spoken by God through the prophets.  In fact, we find other references to the Old Testament referring to God speaking through the prophets.

• Words spoken through the prophet Jeremiah are referenced in Matt. 2:17, 27:9.
• Words spoken through the prophet Isaiah are referenced in Matt. 1:22, 8:17; John 12:37-40.
• Words spoken through the prophets Moses and Hosea are referenced in Matt. 2:15.
• Words spoken through the prophet David are referenced in Matt. 13:34-35.
• Words spoken through the prophet Zechariah are referenced in Matt. 21:4.
• Words spoken through the prophets generically are referenced in Matt. 26:56.

Because the prophets speak for God, write Scripture, and make prophecies, the Scriptures must be fulfilled.  It is the written Scriptures that are referenced here.  It is not some vague and ambiguous reference to some areas of the Bible that "contain" the word of God.

The problem of subjectivity

If the Bible contains the word of God but is not the word of God, then we must ask which parts of the Bible are the Word of God and which are not?  The problem in answering this question is that the one who seeks to do so inadvertently places himself as the judge of what is and what is not inspired and without error.  But by what standard would such a person make such judgment?

What about the numerous contradictions in the Bible?

It is true that there are difficulties within the Word of God.  But these are due to copying errors through the centuries.  As more and more historical, archaeological, and manuscript evidence is uncovered, the fewer Bible difficulties there are. Nevertheless, for an examination of answers to the alleged Bible contradictions, please see The Bible Difficulties section in the navigation menu on the left.

Conclusion

When claims that the Bible contains the word of God but is not the word of God are made, it is done so usually because the critic of inspiration wants to assert that the original documents in the Bible contained errors.  The problem is that this undermines the very trustworthiness of God's Word.  How are we to decide what is and is not inspired and therefore true if the very breath of God moving through a sinner results in documents with mistakes?  Does this inspire trust in God's Word?  Does it promote security and rest in believing God's Word?  Obviously not.

This undermines the faith of Christians and is, naturally, a dangerous and false teaching.

 

• 1. The Epistles from the apostles were publicly read in the church assemblies. Ignatius [Epistle to the Ephesians, 12], Polycarp [Epistle to the Philippians, 3.11,12], Clement [Epistle to the Corinthians, 1.47]"  (Jamieson, Robert; Fausset, A.R.; and Brown, David. Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1998.)

[boatbums]

You seem to forget that, while under the influence of rabbinical scholars who did not believe Jesus was the Messiah (a group Jesus called "spiritually blind") Jerome's initial opinion was against the LXX; but he later included the deuterocanonicals in his translation precisely because he did not want to rely on his own opinion, or on rabbinical opinion influenced by their ongoing anti-Christian polemic, but on the actual practice of the church. He went with the texts received and preserved by the churches for liturgical use.

No, I didn't forget. Jerome translated the Old Testament from the Hebrew and also did the Deuterocanonicals/Apocryphals from the Greek Septuagint into the Latin under orders from Rome. His own opinion of those books was that they were not part of the Hebrew canon recognized by the Jews and he included forwards to each of these books explaining why they were considered secondary to the universally accepted divinely-inspired Scriptures. I question the challenge put out by some that the reason the Jews rejected those books was because of their "Christian" influence. That is ludicrous for two simple reasons, there WAS no Christian influence during the times these intertestamental books were written (Christ had not come yet) and NOTHING in these books can be interpreted as "Christian" in the first place. The Jews - unto whom Paul said had been given the "Oracles of God" - did not accept these books as Divinely-inspired.

That the early church used some of these books for edification purposes and was why they were included among liturgical material is not at issue. What IS at issue is the contention that these books are equally inspired and binding upon a believer as the rest of the unanimously accepted Scriptures. Even early church fathers differentiated them as such.

Ecumenical Councils are generally prodded into action by dissent, controversy, conflict. There's no particular reason to define things which nobody out there is bug-tussling about. The purpose of the Council is to confirm what has been received by the Church, and by the Church I mean Christendom: by believers East and West going back to Apostolic times.

We can leave aside the questionable "development of doctrine" versus the Vincentian Canon for another day. The "bug-tussling" on the canon has NOT been resolved on these questionable books and their place and purpose for the Christian life and beliefs. Even after the Council of Trent - among Catholics even, there continued to be disagreement. It really is not as "settled" as some would have us believe. I learned that:

There was a group of scholars at the Council of Trent that were considered fairly knowledgeable on this issue. One particular was Cardinal Seripando. The Roman Catholic historian (and expert on Trent) Hubert Jedin explained “…[H]e was aligned with the leaders of a minority that was outstanding for its theological scholarship” at the Council of Trent.

Jedin is worth quoting at length:

“(Seripando was) Impressed by the doubts of St. Jerome, Rufinus, and St. John Damascene about the deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament, Seripando favored a distinction in the degrees of authority of the books of the Florentine canon. The highest authority among all the books of the Old Testament must be accorded those which Christ Himself and the apostles quoted in the New Testament, especially the Psalms. But the rule of citation in the New Testament does not indicate the difference of degree in the strict sense of the word, because certain Old Testament books not quoted in the New Testament are equal in authority to those quoted. St. Jerome gives an actual difference in degree of authority when he gives a higher place to those books which are adequate to prove a dogma than to those which are read merely for edification. The former, the protocanonical books, are "libri canonici et authentici"; Tobias, Judith, the Book of Wisdom, the books of Esdras, Ecclesiasticus, the books of the Maccabees, and Baruch are only "canonici et ecclesiastici" and make up the canon morum in contrast to the canon fidei. These, Seripando says in the words of St. Jerome, are suited for the edification of the people, but they are not authentic, that is, not sufficient to prove a dogma. Seripando emphasized that in spite of the Florentine canon the question of a twofold canon was still open and was treated as such by learned men in the Church. Without doubt he was thinking of Cardinal Cajetan, who in his commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews accepted St. Jerome's view which had had supporters throughout the Middle Ages.”

Source: Hubert Jedin, Papal Legate At The Council Of Trent (St Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1947), 270-271

“For the last time [Seripando] expressed his doubts [to the Council of Trent] about accepting the deuterocanonical books into the canon of faith. Together with the apostolic traditions the so-called apostolic canons were being accepted, and the eighty-fifth canon listed the Book of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) as non-canonical. Now, he said, it would be contradictory to accept, on the one hand, the apostolic traditions as the foundation of faith and, on the other, to directly reject one of them.”

Source: Hubert Jedin, Papal Legate At The Council Of Trent (St Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1947), 278.

Jedin also documents a group of excellent scholars that stood against “tradition” as being on the same level of authority as scripture:

“In his opposition to accepting the Florentine canon and the equalization of traditions with Holy Scripture, Seripando did not stand alone. In the particular congregation of March 23, the learned Dominican Bishop Bertano of Fano had already expressed the view that Holy Scripture possessed greater authority than the traditions because the Scriptures were unchangeable; that only offenders against the biblical canon should come under the anathema, not those who deny the principle of tradition; that it would be unfortunate if the Council limited itself to the apostolic canons, because the Protestants would say that the abrogation of some of these traditions was arbitrary and represented an abuse… Another determined opponent of putting traditions on a par with Holy Scripture, as well as the anathema, was the Dominican Nacchianti. The Servite general defended the view that all the evangelical truths were contained in the Bible, and he subscribed to the canon of St. Jerome, as did also Madruzzo and Fonseca on April 1. While Seripando abandoned his view as a lost cause, Madruzzo, the Carmelite general, and the Bishop of Agde stood for the limited canon, and the bishops of Castellamare and Caorle urged the related motion to place the books of Judith, Baruch, and Machabees in the "canon ecclesiae." From all this it is evident that Seripando was by no means alone in his views. In his battle for the canon of St. Jerome and against the anathema and the parity of traditions with Holy Scripture, he was aligned with the leaders of a minority that was outstanding for its theological scholarship.”

Source: Hubert Jedin, Papal Legate At The Council Of Trent (St Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1947), 281-282. (From http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2006/06/who-were-some-of-best-scholars-at.html)

[one Lord one faith one baptism]

LOL, under “ orders from Rome”

sometimes you just have to laugh, but it is really sad.

St Jerome, was a faithful Catholic who did not substitute his judgement for that of the Universal Church.

Here’s a question for you BB, do you actually think St Jerome was a saved Christian? after all, he believed in baptismal regeneration, he believed the Eucharist was the Body of Christ, he believed the Pope was the head of the Church as successor to St Peter, etc. etc.

[evangmlw]

and this is why you are lost my friend

[Mrs. Don-o]

Thank you, wow! That looks fascinating. I’m going to print it off when I get a chance. (These old eyes....)

[chajin]

Or having to kill witches, or having multiple wives, or slaves, or not eating bacon, or killing your child for denying god, etc., etc.

Since I have to get up at 4 AM tomorrow, which is about five hours from now, I will only deal with two of these, maybe three.

First, slavery. As a general rule, the Bible discourages but does not prohibit slavery. In Torah (the Jewish law), a person may sell him/herself into indentured servanthood for a period of time (usually seven years) to pay off debts, and can choose to remain a slave after that if s/he desires, but there are a host of regulations concerning how all of this is done, which are designed to protect the person entering into the indenture or slavery. Since people generally did not work for monetary pay unless they were day laborers, anyone who was an "employee" was essentially working in return for room and board, which is essentially the effect of slavery. In Greco-Roman times, most professionals were "slaves," in that they worked for a member of the nobility and had no say in what they received, how they were treated, or whether they could quit. It was to this situation that the Epistles discuss the idea of how one should, as a master, treat a slave, or how one should work for a master as a slave, and the general rule is, the master treats the slave the way he would treat himself, and the slave works for the master as if working for God—whether or not the master happened to be Christian or non-Christian, nice or mean. Paul also states at one point that if a person is able to purchase his/her way out of slavery, the person should do so. None of which has anything to do with the heinous practices associated with slavery in the antebellum US, or the way slavery is practiced throughout most of the world: the Bible clearly considers such slavery to be unjust, because of the way the slave is both measured (as being less than human) and treated.

Second, having multiple wives. Polygamy is only part of a general issue, which is what God desired marriage to be. The clue to this is found in Matthew 19, where Jesus discusses divorce, that God allowed it in Torah because of sklerokardia. When Nathan berates David for having taken Bathsheba, he attributes God as saying that if, among other things, David thought he didn't have enough wives, all he had to do was ask for them, and he would have obtained more (II Sam. 12:8), but that would also have demonstrated sklerokardia, because David's heart would not have been open to his present wife(s). The Bible clearly has a view as to what marriage is supposed to be, and both polygamy and divorce were concessions to the hard-heartedness of humans before Christ--concessions that are no longer acceptable, because there is no excuse, with the Holy Spirit in our hearts, for hard-heartedness.

OK, bacon. Why God banned bacon in Torah is something we could discuss at another time, though it isn't too much of a stretch to assume that a God who was smart enough to create the universe would be smart enough to know about trichinosis--nevertheless, it is evident that it is one of the many ways that the Hebrews were to differentiate themselves from the Gentiles. However, the ban is lifted by Christ, both in His own teachings and in those of the disciples, and the reason is also clear: the differentiation was no longer necessary, because in Christ there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile, between slave and free, between male and female--each has a position, but ontologically there is no longer any difference, because in Christ they are all part of one body, the church.

[boatbums]

If the Bible only contains 66 books, this means that no one had the correct Bible for the first 1,500 years of Church History and the same men used by the Holy Spirit to compile the 27 book NT, somehow got the OT canon wrong. if that is possible, who is to say that they didn’t get the NT wrong as well. see how dangerous this thinking is?

Whether or not any church group had a 66 or 73 book canon doesn't change the fact that they STILL had a correct Bible. No one disagrees on the undisputed books (66) and there is NOTHING in the disputed books that is absolutely necessary to know for our salvation and life of holiness that was left out of the other 66 books. The only thing that is "dangerous" is when any particular church thinks it can mandate to all other churches what is or is not the word of God. That can only lead to further heresy where the next thing they do is try to command obedience to traditions which have no basis in Scripture. The Holy Spirit is who illuminates the word of God in our hearts and Jesus' sheep hear His voice throughout it.

[Heart-Rest]

Thanks for those links, Salvation.

Another good, clear explanation of the correct canon of scripture (for all those genuinely seeking the truth) can be found here:

   "DEFENDING THE DEUTEROCANONICALS" by James Akin

[mlo]

Well you skipped the most fun ones. :-)

The fact that people, who've had centuries to do it, can come up with justifications for their choices doesn't change the fact that this is what they are doing. Constructing justifications for not following clear instructions, in some cases explicit commands, that are no longer acceptable.

This: "The Bible clearly has a view as to what marriage is supposed to be, and both polygamy and divorce were concessions to the hard-heartedness of humans before Christ--concessions that are no longer acceptable, because there is no excuse, with the Holy Spirit in our hearts, for hard-heartedness."; doesn't even sound convincing. It's a superficial justification for no longer engaging in the polygamy that is common and accepted in the Bible.

Same goes for the bacon argument. I missed the part where Jesus said it was OK to eat bacon now. The original reasons for the rule aren't hard to understand, given the times. Things have changed and now we know better, and behave accordingly. Regardless of what the Bible says. Because we pick and choose.

As I said, thank god. Because if we didn't? That bit about killing your child for taking up other gods, and killing witches, and other fun bits? Those are very clear commands and aren't optional.

[Salvation]

That would be a good one to post one of these days.

[imardmd1]

The Cristian Church recognizes a collection of 73 books.

I don't think this is quite true. The deuterocanonical books have been preserved by the churches, but are not inspired, as the autographs Scriptures comprising the 66 books as laid out by the translators of the English Bible are.

[Heart-Rest]

That sounds like a good idea. It might be helpful to some folks here.

Would you have time and be willing to post it one of these days?

You do a much better job posting new threads than I do (if you can find the time, and are willing to do it one of these days).

[Heart-Rest]

Re: Your tagline

Have you seen these?

• Buddhism 1

• Buddhism 2

• Judaism

[imardmd1]

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 ESV

". . . your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you . . ."

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 ESV

". . . you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you . . ."

====

Your interpretation of this translation is in error. The subject of these phrases is not an individual.

These uses of "You" is plural, not singular, in the Greek text and in the Authorized Version; but "body" and "temple" are singular. Thus the grammar, as used by the Holy Ghost, demands that the subject is the aggregation of souls comprising the local church; here specifically that assembly meeting at Corinth, and by extension to any truly ordained local church anywhere, a Body whose Head is The Lord Jesus Christ.

These passages cannot be translated and interpreted otherwise, though they often are, very mistakenly by those who do not discern that each is only a member of The Body of The Lord, The Holy Ghost suffusing throughout the regenerated constituents congregated to remember Him and for public instruction.

It is the local Assembled Company that is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and counting themselves blessed by His Presence.

"But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup.
For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body" (1 Cor. 11:28-29 AV)

With respect for the gravity of The Inscripturated Will of God.

[imardmd1]

There is no way Moses could have known all the things that Genesis, for example, relates except by the leading of the Holy Spirit.

Just remarking that we ought not forget that Moses was a prince of Egypt, trained to rule in a very sophisticated empire. We can assume that his education included studies in the history of the patriarchs.

One suspects that the great governor Joseph, steward of pharaohs and protector of his kin, probably left some kind of repository of annals of not only his own experiences, but also of the wise men of the Anatolian Urartans, among whom his own father Jacob dwelt for many years.

The tradition over the four hundred and some years survived very likely orally, and not unlikely in written format in the kingdom libraries, which would have constituted a chain-of-eyewitness documentation, a Providentially preserved proto-Bible, waiting for Moses' editorial hand -- just speculatin'.

Perhaps a further purpose would have been to keep the language and writing alive through the residence and growth of the Hebrew peoples in Goshen.

[chajin]

I missed the part where Jesus said it was OK to eat bacon now.

"And [Jesus] said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” Thus he declared all foods clean." Mark 7:18-19 (ESV)

[ealgeone]

Whether or not any church group had a 66 or 73 book canon doesn't change the fact that they STILL had a correct Bible. No one disagrees on the undisputed books (66) and there is NOTHING in the disputed books that is absolutely necessary to know for our salvation and life of holiness that was left out of the other 66 books. The only thing that is "dangerous" is when any particular church thinks it can mandate to all other churches what is or is not the word of God. That can only lead to further heresy where the next thing they do is try to command obedience to traditions which have no basis in Scripture. The Holy Spirit is who illuminates the word of God in our hearts and Jesus' sheep hear His voice throughout it.

There are however non-biblical teachings in the "disputed book", which really aren't disputed by the Hebrews or the early church. It is the RCC that continues to purport these are inspired Scripture.

[ealgeone]

lol, nice deflection.

there were no 66 book bibles before the 16th century. PERIOD.

If that makes you feel better....ok. END OF DISCUSSION.

If someone wants to believe that NO ONE had an accurate Bible before the 16th century, well, there is not much anyone can really do for such a person other than pray for them.

I said that by 400 AD the 27 NT and 39 OT were agreed upon by the church. The apocrypha was not considered as inspired as the rest of the OT. Please see my post #66.

A more accurate statement would be the RCC has not had an accurate Bible since the Council of Trent.

It's been a fun discussion.

[Boogieman]

Funny, I thought you would be familiar with the English language, where the word has come to mean more than just how it is used in the Bible.

[Boogieman]

“funny, Jesus spoke of His Church, singular. I didn’t realize there could be more than one Church, certainly the Scriptures only speak of one Church.”

Actually, this isn’t even true:

“Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.” (Acts 9:31)

“For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.” (1 Cor. 14:33)

“The churches of Asia salute you.” (1 Cor. 16:19)

“Who have for my life laid down their own necks: unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles.” (Rom. 16:4)

“What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia...” (Rev. 1:11)

[Mrs. Don-o]

HaHa. Pretty good!