Wed..9.2.15...An Unbelievable Story...John 8:1-11

Let me tell you an unbelievable story about the trustworthiness of the New Testament. Back 2,000 years ago, many books and letters were written down on papyrus, the ancestor to our modern day paper. You can imagine how quickly those pieces of paper of the New Testament would get worn out as they were passed around from one church group to another. Plus, if one person copied it and then others made copies of that copy, after a while, you could start to have copying errors being passed on, such as spelling errors, writing a word twice and skipping a word or a line. To err is human. (Just look at the the erors inn wat we right even today. Thank God for Spell Check, err, when people use it :) So God did an unbelievable thing. To prevent any chance of human errors, he himself wrote his words on gold tablets and kept them preserved inside a holy shrine guarded by the Knights Templar at Petra along with the holy grail. Those who could view them were limited to believers who would take a leap of faith to safely cross over a huge chasm guarding such. Like I said, it's an unbelievable story. ('Course I didn't entirely make it up :)

The truth is that ordinary people like you and me excitedly read the inspired books and letters of the NT and made copies for their church or for themselves. Eventually the originals wore out. We simply don't have them anymore. But we do have thousands of copies of the originals. When you have so many early copies saying the same thing, you know that is what the original also said. There is also a whole branch of scholarly study called textual criticism, which examines such things as the invariable variants between copies. (Don't know why those first copiers didn't just use Spell-Check:) None of those typos and variant readings between one manuscript and another affect any doctrine of Scripture. But this does bring us to a controversial subject, which we will see in our passage today, John 7:53-8:11. Does that cherished passage even belong in our Bibles? You will find good Christians on both sides of this controversial issue. The first link below argues more against it being included. The second link argues more in favor of including it. It's more reading than I expect you to tackle now, but at least you've got sites to go to when you have the time. http://ift.tt/1w2FWeS
http://ift.tt/1JAWEKq

Now let's step out in faith, believing that God can minister to us from this event that both sides agree, surely happened. Read John 8:1-11. We are very familiar with it, but at the time, it was a stunning, unbelievable story of God's forgiveness. Look at verse 11. What a lot of Christians leave out these days is not this story from the Bible, but the call to leave their life of sin. Others may be so eager to win someone to Christ that they never include the call to repent. "Just believe." But the gospel is a call both to repent and to believe the good news. "Leave your life of sin." Jesus had a similar message for the invalid he healed. "Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you" 5:14. Hell!

1.- Jesus is so gracious. He did not come to condemn us, but to forgive us. What was one thing that his grace led you to leave (repent of) when you came to Christ? 

Perhaps people who knew the old you and heard of the changes God made in you, were saying, "That's an unbelievable story." But you and I know it's wonderfully true. "Neither do I condemn you, go now and leave your life of sin."

2.- See below.

Announcements
Remember last week I asked you to go to the Contacts tab and fill in the names and email addresses of your two prayer warriors. Have you done that? I will be asking you to answer that Friday. Thanks for doing this. It's only to aid you with surface to air defense. 

Thank you Lord for the five new men who just joined us in August- Tim Dearborn, Lemmy Lukudu, Pastor Mike Berry, Kevin Long and Dave Ramirez (he first posted on the last day of August).

I want to honor the men who were Unstoppable on the blog every day for the month of August: Alex Dyckman, Andre Vargas, Armando Hernandez, Dave Heidekrueger, Eddie Morales, George Doherty, George Rabiela, Jack Rogers, Jose Billegas, Phil Raymond, Ricardo Guardiola, Robert Roman, Roger Vinlasaca, Sam Vargas, Vince Diaz and Tim Dearborn. Way to go men! You set a great example to all. You are Semper Fi- always faithful. 

Below are the results of everyone for the 21 days (M-F) in August. I noticed that those who missed only 1 day were quick to make it up. Remember, you can go back and make up any date you missed while we are going through the gospel of John (or any book or topical study we do) and then still earn your Recognition Of Completion toward your ABS one year certificate (Academy of Biblical Studies). If you didn't score well in August, simply join the others who have made the Unstoppable pledge. "No scripture, no sleep." My highest priority is to God's word and God's kingdom. I will be devoted to God's word and devoted to my brothers as we seek to advance God's kingdom. (See Mt.6:33; Acts 2:42; Rom.12:10) Be a no excuses man. Be an unstoppable man. 

2.- What is your goal for the 22 blogging days of September? Put a stretching number down and then aim to hit it. As it's been said, "If you don't aim at something, you're sure to hit nothing every time." 

For those who are new, the U indicates that these men have earned their Unstoppable award pin by being faithful every day for a month straight. Congratulations to Tim Dearborn who just completed such! The R column represents the number of brothers those M3 men have recruited. By recruiting one person and being Unstoppable for a month, you graduate from being a Pro in Basic Training and move up to being an M3 Coach. Several are on the verge of graduating. Go get 'em!

Squad 1
Eddie Morales	U	R5	21
Fire Team 1
William Dyckman	U	R1	17
Phil Raymond	U		21
Ismael Andrade	U	R2	15
James Schmidt	U		18
Fire Team 2
Gary Remson	U	R1	18
Luis Ortiz	U		18
Alex Dyckman	U		21
Squad 2
Sam Vargas	U	R3	21
Fire Team 1
Oscar Nunez	U		15
Lou Ojeda	U		18
Fire Team 2
Israel Fuentes	U	R1	20
Dave Ramirez			1/1
Dave DeBoer	U	R1	20
Tim Dearborn	U		20/20
Squad 3
Robert Roman	U	R1	21
Fire Team 1
Vince Diaz	U	R1	21
Nic Palhegyi	U	R1	20
Mike Dunn			13
Rich Petre			8
Fire Team 2
Osiris Alday	U		20
Ed Lake			13
Squad 4
George Rabiela	U	R1	21
Fire Team 1
Dave Heidekrueger	U	R2	21
Michael Gonzalez			13
Chuy Cervantes	U		21
Fire Team 2
Rich Guardiola	U	R1	21
Horacio De La Torre	U		20
Squad 5
Jack Rogers	U	R5	21
Fire Team 1
Roger Vinlasaca	U	R1	21
Armando Hernandez	U		21
Jose Billegas	U		21
Fire Team 2
George Doherty	U	R1	21
Andre Vargas	U		21
Lemmy Lukudu		R1	10/10
Kevin Long			3/3
Squad 6
Mike Berry			8/8