The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him today and what came to my heart and mind in John 21:25,
"Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written."
This, to me, is a very fascinating verse. It should guide us in our reading and studying of all the narrative literature throughout the entire Bible. What John is saying here is that there were many other accounts of things not written down. His comment about the vast number of books it would take to document all Jesus did expresses how enormous the library would be. There were a lot of things that took place while Jesus was here that we don't know anything about. Based on John's statement, we don't know most of what happened when Jesus was here. Have you ever thought about that?
What this means is that we only have certain select accounts of things that took place that the Lord wants us to be informed about. In other words, we can read it all, but we only know some of the things that transpired. This tells me two things. First, what we do read is handpicked, curated by the Lord for us. The Lord wants us to know these things. Secondly, the events we do not have provided us are apparently deemed by the Lord as not important for us to know.
What we have is intentional. We read in 2 Peter 1:20-21, "Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation of things. For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." The choice of things John wrote about were not chosen by John himself, but were the events and conversations, etc. the Lord wanted to make available to us. John was "carried along", that is inspired, to write what he wrote.
Something that arises from this is consideration of the value of "argumentum ex silentio" - an argument from silence in our interpretation of Scripture. You may have heard in a sermon or wherever, that because "x" is not found in Scripture then "this..." or "that...". Finding proof in something not mentioned in Scripture can be snare, and particularly in the narrative portions of Scripture like John's gospel.
In an article written by Steven Lewis from Southern Evangelical Seminary and Bible College, he says, "... the argument from silence is a fallacy of weak induction that treats the absence of evidence as evidence itself. This logical fallacy essentially takes an appeal to authority and flips it around. The appeal to authority says that because an authority A says x, then x must be true; the argument from silence says that because an authority A didn't say x, then x must be false. In effect, the silence of the authority regarding some particular claim is taken as evidence against the claim itself."
"Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written."
This, to me, is a very fascinating verse. It should guide us in our reading and studying of all the narrative literature throughout the entire Bible. What John is saying here is that there were many other accounts of things not written down. His comment about the vast number of books it would take to document all Jesus did expresses how enormous the library would be. There were a lot of things that took place while Jesus was here that we don't know anything about. Based on John's statement, we don't know most of what happened when Jesus was here. Have you ever thought about that?
What this means is that we only have certain select accounts of things that took place that the Lord wants us to be informed about. In other words, we can read it all, but we only know some of the things that transpired. This tells me two things. First, what we do read is handpicked, curated by the Lord for us. The Lord wants us to know these things. Secondly, the events we do not have provided us are apparently deemed by the Lord as not important for us to know.
What we have is intentional. We read in 2 Peter 1:20-21, "Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation of things. For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." The choice of things John wrote about were not chosen by John himself, but were the events and conversations, etc. the Lord wanted to make available to us. John was "carried along", that is inspired, to write what he wrote.
Something that arises from this is consideration of the value of "argumentum ex silentio" - an argument from silence in our interpretation of Scripture. You may have heard in a sermon or wherever, that because "x" is not found in Scripture then "this..." or "that...". Finding proof in something not mentioned in Scripture can be snare, and particularly in the narrative portions of Scripture like John's gospel.
In an article written by Steven Lewis from Southern Evangelical Seminary and Bible College, he says, "... the argument from silence is a fallacy of weak induction that treats the absence of evidence as evidence itself. This logical fallacy essentially takes an appeal to authority and flips it around. The appeal to authority says that because an authority A says x, then x must be true; the argument from silence says that because an authority A didn't say x, then x must be false. In effect, the silence of the authority regarding some particular claim is taken as evidence against the claim itself."
I only take the opportunity here to mention the argument from silence because of the reality of what John said and because you hear people attempting it from time to time. A lot of other things happened that we don't read about in his gospel. That can make the study of John's gospel ripe territory for assuming, for instance, what else Jesus might or might not have discussed in his meeting with Nicodemus that night in John 3:1-21. Can we assume they didn't discuss, say, the weather since it isn't mentioned? No. Likewise we can't assume they did. Often it is pointless to make these kinds of assumptions or arguments. While musing on whether they discussed the weather or didn't is trivial, sometimes an argument from silence is brandished where there is real consequence.
Just some food for thought...
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know.
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know.
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