Prior Book | Prior Chapter | Prior Verse | Next Verse | Next Chapter | Next Book | Viewing NASB and Amplified 2015 | |
NASB | 2 Timothy 2:15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | 2 Timothy 2:15 Study and do your best to present yourself to God approved, a workman [tested by trial] who has no reason to be ashamed, accurately handling and skillfully teaching the word of truth. |
Subject: Logic: The Means to Rightly Divide |
Bible Note: For the sake of clarity, here is my theological position on this topic explictly stated. The following is an excerpt from an article I wrote some years ago: The T in TULIP stands for the "Total Depravity of Man." In the 17th century, this concept was more commonly called "original sin." Some still use this term today. Of each of the Five Points this is probably the least well understood. God is sovereign and yet He created Man a responsible being. How can both these statements be true? I affirm both of these truths, for they are both taught in Scripture. It is a paradox. Indeed, to accept the Sovereignty of God and deny the responsibility of Man is to affirm an unbiblical hyper-Calvinism. To deny the Sovereignty of God and accept the responsibility of Man is to affirm an unbiblical Arminianism. Scripture clearly teaches that Man is accountable to God (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14, Romans 14:12). Adam and Eve -- the parents of humanity -- were created as morally responsible people. They were created without sin (Ecclesiastes 7:29), but they fell from this state by disobeying God (Genesis 3). Since Adam is the father of mankind, his sin effected the whole human race (Romans 5:12-19). Ever since Man has been flawed by sin. Every human being (except Jesus Christ because He was born of a virgin) has inherited original sin (Psalms 51:5, Romans 3). Man is born in sin with an evil and wicked nature (Matthew 7:11, Ephesians 2:3). Men even shares the same evil nature as Satan (John 8:44). Man sins by choice and by the motivation of his very nature. Sin fills every aspect of his being from head to toe (Isaiah 1:5-6). His heart and mind is filled with it (Ecclesiastes 9:3, Ephesians 4:17-19, Titus 1:15, 1 Timothy 3:8, 6:5). "The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and desperately wicked" (Jeremiah 17:9). There remains no good in man (Romans 7:18). Man is basically evil, not good. His heart is as hard as stone (Ezekiel 11:19, Jeremiah 23:29). Man imagines that he is only sick, but the Bible says he is dead (Ephesians 2:1, Colossians 2:13). Man feels he is, at worst, near-sighted, but Scripture says he is blind (2 Corinthians 3:14). Man shrugs off his vices as minor, but the Word says he is a slave (John 8:44, Ephesians 2:2, 2 Timothy 2:26). I simultaneously affirm that men are "free moral agents" but deny that the natural Man has a "free will." How can Man's will be free when the Bible repeatedly calls it enslaved? Man is enslaved to his sinful nature. Worse than that, he is a willing slave, not wanting to be free! He would rather be a slave to sin than serve God as his King. It gets worse! Because of this utter sinfulness of human nature, Man lacks the moral ability to change his nature (Jeremiah 13:23). He can't stop sinning or even want to stop sinning (2 Peter 2:14). Everything he does has a sinful motive behind it, even when his actions outwardly appear good (Genesis 6:5). Man is unable to obey God (Matthew 7:18, Romans 8:7-8). He never seeks God (Romans 3:11). He is unwilling and unable to come to God for help (John 3:19-20, John 5:40, John 6:44, 65). Furthermore, I deny that man is ever morally neutral (Matthew 6:24, 12:20). Man is always set against God. His will is not neutral or self-determining. He always wills in accordance with his nature. Since his nature is evil, his thoughts and motives are always evil. But this moral inability does not annul his responsibility. Quite the contrary it compounds his guilt. Remember, this sinfulness is self-inflicted. God does not cancel Man's debt simply because Man has squandered the loan and is unable to pay God back. Man is guilty and deserves to go to Hell (Romans 6:23). Granted, there are degrees of sin. Some individual sins are worse than others, and some sinners are worse than other sinners (John 19:11). But even the least sinner is totally depraved and morally unable to obey. Deep down all men love sin and hate God with all their hearts (Proverbs 21:10, Matthew 6:24, John 3:19-20). Man is totally without hope (Ephesians 2:12), without strength to obey (Romans 5:6) and without excuse (Romans 2:1). When you see me write about humans as "totally depraved" I am making an extensive, rather than an intensive statement. The effect of the fall upon man is that sin has extended to every part of his personality -- his thinking, his emotions, and his will. Not necessarily that he is intensely sinful, but that sin has extended to the entire being. Sin taints everything that is human. In Him, Doc |