Alright, we're here in Revelation chapter 22, and we're going to be doing a two-part series on the Apocrypha.
Now, the Apocrypha is basically a part of the Bible that we do not have, it's not part of God's holy book,
but it's something that the Catholics add to the Bible.
And the Catholics believe that the Apocrypha is part of Scripture, which obviously we do not believe it is.
Now, I'm going to be preaching through a series eventually on kind of the history of the King James Bible,
but honestly that's outside the scope of this sermon.
When I became King James only, what convinced me was I saw the pure Word of God,
and then I saw the NIV and other versions.
And it was just very obvious to me, there's no difference there.
And so I'm going to basically just, we're going to read a lot of the Apocrypha here today in this sermon,
and it's going to be very obvious to you there's a difference between the book of James and the Apocrypha,
between the book of Revelation and the Apocrypha.
Now, in Revelation chapter 22, notice what it says in verse 18.
For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book,
if any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto them the plagues that are written in this book.
And see, the Bible has a curse set aside to those that would add to God's Word, okay?
Now, usually we think of just adding two verses, like changing the words a little bit,
but the Catholic Church just adds books to the Bible.
I mean, they add seven as part of their official Apocrypha,
and there's a lot of others that other Catholics believe should be part of it as well.
And so they basically just want to add all these other books to the Bible.
Now, verse number 19, the Bible reads,
And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy,
God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city,
and from the things which are written in this book.
Basically, God is saying that if you would mess around with His Word, you basically have one way ticket to hell.
You have no chance and no hope of going to heaven.
But you might say, Brother Stuckey, how do you know that the Apocrypha is not supposed to be in the Bible?
I mean, how do we really know?
Because there's like hundreds of books that people say should be part of the Bible.
How do we know that James was supposed to be in there?
Don't we have to look at all the councils throughout history?
Because there's just been this big debate in Christianity of what is in the Bible and what's not in the Bible.
No, you're misunderstanding history.
There's been a debate between non-Christians between what's in the Bible and what's not in the Bible.
Look, there's a lot of debates that unsaved Christians have.
Those are not debates that Christians have, though.
Unsaved Christians will sit around just debating about whether or not the parable of the sower, how many of these are saved.
I mean, they didn't bring forth any fruits.
I mean, I don't think they got saved, do you?
As Christians, we don't debate about that.
Because it's clear that they received the Word.
We know that they got saved.
Look, unsaved people will debate about Christian topics all the time.
They'll debate about oneness, they'll debate about all these things.
But saved people know what the truth is.
They have the Spirit of Truth inside of us.
And what I want you to understand, we didn't need any councils to know what is the Word of God.
Because as a saved person with the Spirit of Truth inside of you, you can read and tell what's true and what's not true.
Now, unsaved people, yeah, they debate about it.
They're confused.
They don't know, and they have arguments.
And I've read a lot of their arguments.
And they think it sounds real cold and logical.
But I'm just like, man, that doesn't make any sense.
And look, it's going to be very clear to you, not just in this two-part series, but in today's sermon, that the Apocrypha is a joke.
That it clearly was not part of the Bible.
And the first thing I want you to realize before we really get to the Apocrypha, is I want you to realize that there is no power in the Apocrypha.
There is no power in the Apocrypha.
Turn to Hebrews 1.
Hebrews 1.
One of the big things you notice when you read the Bible is just how powerful it is.
You read it, and it will just pierce your heart if you're guilty of something.
You come across that verse, read therein all the days of thy life, and you haven't been reading the Bible much recently.
Like, man, that one got me.
You read verses in the Bible, and you can tell that it's the Word of God.
I tell you what, I've read the entire Apocrypha.
I read the entire Apocrypha in preparation for this sermon.
And honestly, I don't think there's too many people in the world that have done that.
There's a couple reasons why.
One, Catholics tell you not to read the Bible.
And so quite honestly, very few of them have ever read the Apocrypha.
And number two, it's so boring that unless you're having trouble sleeping at night, it's like the biggest waste of time you could do.
It was hard to get through it.
I'm just like, oh, this is painful.
But I wanted to find every mistake.
Because you can go on Google and see some really massive mistakes the Apocrypha makes.
But the problem is, the people that are writing those are usually not even saving themselves.
And so they're right about some of those things.
But I said, we need somebody who's, you know, if I'm going to prepare this sermon,
who has the Spirit of God, who knows the truth, knows doctrine, and I wrote down all the mistakes I could find.
It became a two-part sermon instead of one, okay?
Hebrews 1, verse 3, Bob reads,
Who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person,
end up holding all things by the word of His power.
See, when you're reading the Bible, God's word and God's power, they go together.
God's word is very powerful.
Turn to Hebrews 4, Hebrews 4.
And I'll tell you what, if you've ever just read sections of religious books,
the Book of Mormon, the Quran, or any of these books,
you're going to notice there's a big difference between the Bible, God's word, and those books.
Right.
There is no power in them.
Now look, unsaved people like James White will have these huge debates
and talk about the history of all these books, these big arguments and debates.
But look, as a saved person, you can just tell.
Right.
Now obviously, he is not, so he has to go through history
and try to have all these logical Calvinistic arguments.
But quite obviously, as a saved person, you can see what the truth is and what's not the truth.
Right.
There's no comparison.
The King James in the NIV, it's a joke.
There is no comparison.
Right.
It's clear the King James Bible is the word of God, and the NIV is not.
And this is not completely a King James only sermon,
but I just want you to understand, God's word has power,
and when you don't have God's word, there is no power.
Hebrews 4 verse 12,
For the word of God is quick and powerful,
and sharper than any two-edged sword,
piercing even into the dividing asunder of soul and spirit,
and of the joints and marrow,
and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
It mentions a sword.
Imagine being pierced with a sword.
That would hurt, wouldn't it?
Right.
But see, the Bible's speaking about the inside, the joints, the marrow, the heart.
What is it saying?
It's saying that the King James Bible, God's word,
it's a spiritual book that has power to pierce the inside of it.
Thank you.
You see verses in the Bible, and it hits you right in your heart.
Right.
Now that is not something that just normal books are going to do to you.
Right.
When I was a kid, I read a lot of books.
You know, I used to read quite a bit as a kid.
I'd read for a couple hours a day.
And you read these books, those books don't pierce your heart.
They might be entertaining.
They're funny books.
They don't pierce through you, though, like the Bible does.
Right.
Now, I don't want you to misunderstand this,
because although we are a King James only church,
I believe God's word can be translated into any language in the world.
Amen.
Whether it's Tagalog, whether it's Kabampangan, whether it's Spanish,
it doesn't matter the language.
It could be translated into that language, okay?
But I want you to understand that God has given us a perfect book in the King James Bible.
Turn to Acts 6.
Acts 6.
And what we saw in Hebrews 4 is we're turning to Acts 6,
and it says the word of God is quick and powerful.
Now, James White, in his book, The King James Only Controversy,
which I read about 15 years ago after I got saved,
James White in that book says, you know what, that's a confusing verse.
People are not going to be able to understand what quick and powerful means.
And the example he gave was this.
He says, powerful does the word of God mean powerful?
Does the Bible lift weights?
What?
That's an argument to use.
Now, I had just become King James Only,
and I went to a church that was not King James Only.
They handed me that book, and I read it.
And I was like, that's your argument?
That powerful is hard to understand?
My Bible doesn't lift weights.
And he says, quick, my Bible's not moving around.
Now, first of all, the word quick is throughout the King James Bible.
Now, you can look at a secular movie like The Quick and the Dead,
and it's referring to the alive and the dead.
So the Bible's saying, it quickens you, it makes you alive.
It's not saying, hey, man, this Bible's moving around.
It's lifting weights.
It's so strong.
Man, this Bible's in great shape.
The NIV, though, is kind of out of shape.
It's not what it's saying.
When it's saying quick and powerful, it's saying alive and powerful.
I mean, how do you not understand that?
I mean, good night.
I mean, the guy's supposed to be intelligent in the secular world,
but the word powerful, I would have understood that as a five-year-old.
Realizing it's not just referring to muscles that you have.
When you say something's powerful, that's common English language.
I mean, good night.
But that was his argument.
That's the expert it's shown the King James has there.
Well, it shows that he doesn't really have many arguments at all.
In Acts chapter 6, verse 8,
And Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people.
Then there arose certain of the synagogue,
which is called the synagogue of the Libertines,
and Cyrenians, and Alexandrians,
and of them of Cilicia and of Asia, disputing with Stephen.
And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he's faith.
Why is it that they cannot resist Stephen's words that come out of his mouth?
The wisdom and spirit by which he's faith.
Because in the next chapter, what happens to Stephen?
They stone him to death.
And Paul the Apostle was there watching it happen because he's not a believer at the time.
They stone him to death because what he said was so offensive to them.
Now look, it wasn't just because he spoke with a loud voice.
Verse 11 makes that clear.
Then they suborn men which said,
We have heard and speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God.
What was it that he did?
He spoke the words of God.
And they were offended.
Look, God's word has never been liked.
That's the truth.
Throughout the Old Testament, God's prophets were killed.
They were persecuted.
Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross.
John the Baptist was beheaded.
But when you preach the truth, a lot of people get offended by that.
And Stephen preached the truth and they stoned him to death.
Why?
Because what he said was not what they wanted to hear.
It was God's words that were powerful.
Turn to 2 Corinthians 6.
2 Corinthians 6.
Now let me explain to you a problem with people that are new soul winners.
Because when people are new soul winners,
they usually like to use a lot of logical arguments.
And boy, they have a real cute presentation.
They spend 15 minutes and they use like two Bible verses.
Well, there's a problem with that.
The problem is your words aren't that powerful.
The problem is God's words weren't powerful.
And when it says that people get saved, it's the word of reconciliation.
People get saved through the word of God.
You cannot get saved without the word of God.
Now let me explain this very clearly because people get confused about this.
You say, Are you saying people need to know English to get saved?
No, because you can translate something from one language to another.
Right.
Look, if you said,
Look, that's the same thing as Romans 6.23 in the English language.
Right.
You can translate from one language to another language.
Right.
I mean, is it really hard to translate the gift of God?
Look, I'm not an expert at God.
But I'm telling you, it's pretty simple to understand.
Now, unfortunately, we've got translators of the Filipino language that don't seem to understand how to translate some of these verses.
But quite honestly, it's not hard to translate from one language to the next.
Yeah.
Now, it would be hard on some things, and you've got to think about that.
I understand it.
But honestly, when it comes to the Gospel and just explaining these verses,
you can translate from one language to the next, and it loses no power at all.
Right.
Because it's still God's word.
Look, God is not an English-speaking person.
It's not like, wow, man, we speak Spanish.
And God's like, man, I don't know what that means.
French?
Man, I don't know how to speak French.
I don't know a couple of audience.
No.
God can speak any language.
Right.
He can speak any language.
And he's outside of language.
And in the beginning was the word.
So before he even had languages, God's word existed.
Before languages existed, God's word existed.
Right.
So God is outside of languages.
Right.
Now, in 2 Corinthians 6, verse 7.
And by the way, in the English language, before 1611,
people got saved without the King James Bible.
Right.
You say, why?
Because people could have easily translated from one language to the next.
Right.
Look, in 1,000 AD, people got saved in any language.
Because you can translate from one language to the next.
Yep.
OK.
Look, obviously, you can put one sentence into another sentence.
Obviously, there's going to be some changes.
And not everything's that simple.
But honestly, God's word is outside of language.
Right.
2 Corinthians 6, verse 7.
By the word of truth, by the power of God.
By the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left.
Notice, the word of truth, then it mentions the power of God.
You say, why?
Because God's word is powerful.
Right.
OK.
But the Apocrypha is not powerful.
See, the first point we had was the power of the word God.
The second point is the ridiculous stories in the Apocrypha.
Look, in one of their books called Tobit.
Who's heard of Tobit?
It's one of the big books of the Apocrypha.
This is the dumbest reading I've ever seen in my life.
I mean, this is worse than Clifford or curious George.
I mean, it's worse than a little kid's book.
I mean, it's like, when you read it, you're going to claim this is the word of God.
This is a joke.
This is what it says in the book of Tobit, starting in chapter 1 at verse 16.
And I'll explain as we go, because it's kind of confusing.
But look, I read the entire book.
This was very, very difficult.
This was more difficult than when I was five years old reading, like, a book where you don't know the words and things like that.
I mean, it was hard to get through.
Tobit chapter 1, verse 16.
And in the time of Enmesur, I gave many albums to my brethren and gave my bread to the hungry and my clothes to the naked.
And if I saw any of my nation dead or cast about the walls of Nineveh, I buried them.
This man, Tobit, when he sees anybody from his nation who's dead, he buries them.
According to this book, the Assyrian Empire, when they killed the enemy, they would not bury the bodies or burn them or anything.
They just have a bunch of dead bodies in the middle of the road.
You're walking into Robinsons, and you've got, like, 15 dead bodies.
You're stepping over.
I mean, do you realize how stupid that would be?
Do you realize the decaying smell that would be existing everywhere?
That's stupid.
Do you expect me to believe?
And look, the Assyrian Empire was very wicked, but they were obviously very intelligent to be the most powerful empire in the world.
Right, right.
Are you honestly meaning to tell me they just would kill people and say,
you know, we're just going to leave their bodies and just rot to death and let the vultures just eat it every single time?
Look, the Assyrian Empire killed a lot of people.
There's a reason why we preach two sermons against the Assyrian Empire.
They killed a lot of people, and to suggest that they just killed dead bodies and just left them to rot and have this disgusting smell everywhere?
That is stupid.
That is Bobo, and I'm not going to believe any of that.
And look, you have to understand the Apocrypha has so many mistakes and so many things that are stupid,
and if you just look at it logically, that does not make any sense.
The Assyrian Empire was known to be wicked, which obviously the person who wrote this is aware about,
but they didn't just leave dead bodies in the middle of the road.
Right.
They would probably burn them.
They probably wouldn't bury them, but you don't leave dead bodies in the middle of the road.
That's disgusting.
Look, when you see dead cats and rats on the side of the road, it's not like you want to step on those.
Imagine if you have to crawl over dead bodies everywhere.
That's ridiculous.
That doesn't make any sense.
Verse 18.
But this man, he's so godly, he makes it a point.
Every time he sees a dead body, he buries it.
Now, the problem is this book makes it sound like there's a ridiculous amount of dead bodies.
So his full-time job is just burying bodies of his people, according to this book.
Okay.
Verse 18.
And if the king Sennacherib had slain any, when he was come and fled from Judea,
I buried them privately, which means privately, for in his wrath he killed many.
But the bodies were not found when they were sought of the king.
And when one of the Ninevites went and complained to me to the king that I buried them,
and hid myself understanding that I was sought for to be put to death, I withdrew myself for fear.
So according to the Apocrypha, you get the death penalty for burying bodies.
Now look, this story gets worse.
It gets crazy.
But apparently, you get the death penalty if you bury bodies.
They're seeking after him, because what the king is saying is,
I don't see all these dead bodies.
Where are they?
Somebody must have buried them.
And so you know what?
This guy is getting the death penalty for doing that.
That's what it says here.
I mean, do you really expect me to believe that?
That they pronounced the death penalty for burying a body?
You know, honestly, if there's a dead body on the side of the road, they would thank you for burying.
Thank you.
You know, we're sick of that smell.
But apparently, you get the death penalty according to this.
You go to chapter 2, verse 1.
Now when I was come home again, and my wife Anna was restored unto me with my son Tobias.
Because he's been on the run for his life because he's burying dead bodies.
Because he hasn't seen his wife for a long time.
So his wife Anna, his son Tobias, in the feast of Pentecost, which is the holy feast of the seven weeks,
there was a good dinner prepared me into which I sat down to eat.
His wife prepares a nice meal.
They have some fun time as a family together.
They're going to eat.
Verse 2, and when I saw abundance of meat, I said to my son,
go and bring what poor man soever thou shalt find out of our brethren,
who is mindful of the Lord, and lo, I carry food.
So he hasn't seen his family for a long time, and he says,
find some random stranger and just bring him to eat with us.
I mean, are you kidding me?
You haven't seen your family for six months, and just find some random stranger, son,
that's one of our brethren, and have him eat with us.
Look, I don't need that.
That doesn't make logical sense, okay?
But notice verse 3,
But he came again and said, father, one of our nation is strangled.
Basically, he's dead, he was strangled to death, and is cast out in the marketplace.
Now, what does Jonah do when he finds out about a dead man?
So he comes to eat, and one of our people strangled.
Then before I had tasted of any meat, I started up,
and took him up onto a room until the going down of the sun.
Basically, before he eats, he goes out, he gets the body,
he takes the body up into their house until the going down of the sun.
Why? If he's caught burying a dead body into the light,
while it's still sunny outside, he will get the death penalty.
Now look, if you're carrying a dead body into your home,
I think they're going to realize there's something up with that.
Basically, he just carries his dead body into his home,
but he waits until the sun goes down to bury it,
because he's going to get killed to get the death penalty from burying bodies.
Drop down to verse number 7.
It says, therefore I wept, and after the going down of the sun,
I went and made it grave and buried him.
So he goes out, he brings a dead body.
He hasn't seen his wife in six months.
Husbands and wives, imagine this scenario.
If you haven't seen your husband for like six months,
and then all of a sudden he comes back,
you have a meal together, and all of a sudden,
oh wait a minute, one of our brethren, his body hasn't been buried.
So he goes out, he brings a dead body back into your house.
I mean, how happy are you going to be about that?
I mean, what in the world?
And buried him.
But my neighbors mocked me and said,
this man is not yet afraid to be put to death for this matter,
who fled away, and yet lo, he buried the dead again.
So his neighbors are mocking him, saying,
hey, you're going to be put to death, you're burying dead bodies again.
Drop down to verse number 9.
The same night also I returned from the burial,
and slept by the wall of my courtyard,
being polluted, and my face was uncovered.
Now, this is where the story gets really strange.
Because so far, it's just been kind of strange, you know?
Now it's going to get really strange.
So basically, he's outside, and he's depressed.
And you find out in the story also, him and his wife have a fight,
because, well, he's bringing dead bodies back into the house.
So it's kind of understandable your wife's mad at you.
And he has his face uncovered.
Basically, his face is open.
And I knew not that there were sparrows or birds in the wall.
And my eyes being open, the sparrows muted warm dung into my knives.
So basically, the birds poop in his eye.
OK?
He actually gets blinded for years because of this.
This is what the story's about.
The whole story is he's blind for most of the book,
because after he was burying the dead body,
he went outside, and then the bird dropped dung in his eye.
And he just pooped in his eye.
His eye was open, looking up at birds, and then poof, right in the eye.
I mean, I'm not making this up.
This is the Book of Tobit, chapter 2.
And a whiteness came in mine eyes,
and I went to the physicians, and they helped me not.
So now his eyes are just white.
He's blind.
He can't see.
He goes to the physicians, and the physicians, they can't help him.
OK, now, who thinks this is the Word of God so far?
I mean, does this sound like the same King James Bible that we read?
This is a joke.
Chapter 3, chapter 3.
It came to pass the same day that in Ecbatan, a city of media,
Sarah the daughter of Raguel was also reproached by her father's maids
because she had been married to seven husbands
whom Asmodeus the evil spirit had killed before they had lain with them.
There's this woman who is being persecuted also.
She gets married seven times.
And all seven times before they are together,
her husband gets killed by an evil spirit.
It kind of reminds me of that story in the Bible
where, you know, what if, you know, this woman was married
and she didn't have any children, she married another guy.
It's like, well, after seven times, you try her for murder.
It's like you had seven husbands die right after you got married.
It's like, yeah, let's put her on trial for murder, OK?
But apparently this evil spirit is just killing all of her husbands right before
they get to be husband and wife.
And so, anyways, let's go to Tobit's six.
For a second time, we'll skip some stuff.
So basically there's these stories where Tobit is basically going through persecution.
He's blind. There's this woman.
What's going to end up happening is Tobit's son is going to marry this woman
and it breaks the curse for all of them, OK?
This is like a Disney story, right?
You know, it's Cinderella.
Cinderella or what, the seven doors with the apple and stuff.
Yeah, this story at the beginning.
And then the curse ends up getting broken, OK?
And so anyways, in chapter six, and it's really boring, so I'm just skipping a lot of stuff.
Chapter six, verse five, it says,
So the young man did as the angel commanded him,
and when they had roasted the fish, they did eat it.
Then they both went on their way till they drew near to Ekkaton.
Then the young man said to the angel,
Brother Azarias, to what use is the heart and the liver and the ball of the fish?
And he said on,
Yo, I'm touching the heart and the liver.
If a devil or an evil spirit trouble any,
we must make a smoke thereof before the man or the woman,
and the party shall be no more vast.
And as for the goal,
it is good to anoint a man that hath whiteness in his eyes,
and he shall be healed.
What is the apocrypha saying?
The apocrypha is saying practice witchcraft.
Right, right, right.
Make some sort of smoke out of this fish.
Practice witchcraft.
It will help heal blindness of eyes.
So the Bible, or not the Bible,
the apocrypha is teaching sorcery right now.
Right.
Now, what does God think about sorcery?
It's actually something you get the death penalty for.
Right.
Look, I hate to break it to you,
but there's not good magic and bad magic.
Right.
Harry Potter says bad.
Right.
He's evil.
All of that stuff, it's evil.
Look, God does not condone a magic.
There's not black magic and white magic.
It's all wicked.
Right, right.
And look, I know the world makes these entertaining movies.
You think all of these are good.
No, the Bible speaks against sorcery.
Right, right.
And King Saul, when he was right with God, he condemned it.
Okay.
And then he backslides and he goes to the witch and endure.
But look, sorcery is condemned in the Bible.
And the apocrypha is teaching you sorcery as being a good thing.
Verse 15, and I'm skipping a lot of this,
but we get to the end of this story.
Then the angel said unto him,
Dost thou not remember the precepts which thy father gave you?
Did thou shouldest marry a wife with thine own kindred?
Wherefore hear me, O my brother,
for she shall be given thee a wife,
and make thou no reckoning of the evil spirit.
For this same night shall she be given thee in marriage.
When thou shalt come into the marriage chamber,
thou shalt take of the ashes of perfume,
and shalt lay upon them some of the heart and liver of the fish,
and shalt make a smoke with it.
So Tobit's son is going to marry this woman,
and he's being told,
well, you know what, you got to ward off that evil spirit.
You know, you got to practice some black magic, some sorcery,
to get rid of this evil spirit.
You got a fish, you got this, you got a perfume,
and the devil shall smell it and flee away.
Apparently, the devil, who's a roaring lion,
is like, oh man, darling.
He's like a vampire, oh, darling.
I can't take, oh, I'm in Oslo, and I can't take this.
And never come again anymore.
But when thou shalt come to her, rise up both of you,
and pray to God, which is merciful,
who I pity on you, and save you.
Fear not, for she's appointed unto thee from the beginning.
Thou shalt preserve her, and she shall go with thee.
Moreover, suppose that she shall bear the children.
Now when Tobias had heard these things,
he loved her, and his heart was affectionately joined her.
So what ends up happening at the end of the story
is they go through with his sorcery and everything,
and basically they're both scared,
but the devil ends up just fleeing and never coming back,
and they have a family until it's no longer blind.
Now, how in the world could you think this is a book?
I mean, what a joke.
Not only are there things that are taught
that's wicked in the Bible, but that's just a stupid story.
Look, the stories in this book are not stupid.
Nathan Goliath is not a stupid story.
Noah's Ark is not a stupid story.
And that story is just ridiculous.
Not only that, aren't God's prophets pretty tough?
Right?
When you read about Tobit, he's like a girly man.
He's like crying by the side of the wall,
like, oh, I don't remember Ezekiel doing that.
I remember Ezekiel chapter 24 that his wife dies
and he just keeps on serving God.
And yet in this story, Tobit is like a girly man
who's just crying.
He's like crying by the side of the wall,
my life's so bad, and then comes the bird.
I mean, it's like, do you really expect me to believe that?
And look, I'll be honest with you,
atheists mock this book in this story.
You can see them online mocking this
and I understand why they mock it.
Because I'm doing the same thing.
This is ridiculous.
How could you possibly think that this is the work of it?
This is the apocrypha.
Look, I read the entire apocrypha.
This is what it's composed of.
It's garbage.
And if you think this is the word of God,
then you obviously have not done much biography.
Now, I'm just going to give you highlights
from the book of Susanna.
And I can't even read this part of the book of Susanna
because, honestly, it's too bold.
So I'll just give you a recap because it's like pornography.
It's graphic and nobody should be reading it.
But in the book of Susanna, basically, there's
these two guys that are lusting after this woman.
And basically, they work at the house.
And when everybody's gone for the day,
they basically have both independently
decided that they're going to force this woman.
They're going to rape her.
OK, this is in the book of Susanna.
And then all of a sudden, they find out.
And then they're hiding in the bushes.
They find out, oh, wow, you're doing the same thing as me.
And so they basically both agree that they're
both going to do it.
That is the book of Susanna.
And then eventually, you know what?
It doesn't end up happening, blah, blah, blah.
But I mean, that's garbage.
That's disgusting.
How can you say that that is the word of God?
I mean, who comes up with that?
Someone who's minding consciousness is vile?
They confess they know God.
But in works, they deny being abominable and disobedient
unto every good work reprobate.
A reprobate mind comes up with a story like that.
And for Catholics to think this is the word of God,
well, they obviously haven't read the Apocrypha.
I would honestly encourage Catholics, read the Apocrypha.
How can you walk away thinking it's the word?
Even as an unsaved person, how can you
think those stories are supposed to be in God's holy word?
Turn to Proverbs 30.
Proverbs 30.
Look, on the Apocrypha, I doubt that the top one
saw the Surah.
Do I have a Surah?
I mean, I don't see how you can say
that that is the word of God.
That's garbage.
That's disgusting.
That shouldn't be something any of us are reading.
I mean, I couldn't even believe when I was reading this.
I expected the Apocrypha to be boring and to be stupid.
But then I was reading that.
And I was just like, what in the world?
I mean, that's like an X-rayed movie or something.
Like, why are you coming up with something so stupid?
So I will say this in Proverbs 30, verse 5.
Every word of God is pure.
He is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.
Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee
and thou be found alive.
God's word is pure.
Now, the world brainwashes us on what is pure
and what's not pure.
But every word that is in the Bible is pure.
Every single word.
Every part of it, we should love.
We should love the world.
Now, there are parts that the world doesn't like
because it comes in contradiction with the world
we live in today.
When God's word is pure, the book of Susanna is not pure.
The book of Tobit's not pure.
Teaching you sorcery, how can you say that's the word of God?
That contradicts throughout the entire Bible.
The Bible says, be simple concerning evil.
And God, I mean, I'm sure weird, disgusting things like that
in history have happened.
But it's not going to be in God's fully word.
And that's something that none of us should have to read.
Now, turn to Esther 1.
Esther 1.
Look, when you read stories like Genesis 19,
a lot of it's tough to take.
But what you realize is God is very discreet
when he's describing stuff.
He's not very specific.
Now, when you read, you should be able to understand
what he's saying.
And you can't understand.
But he doesn't make it disgustingly graphic
like it's some X-rated movie, like some Bais Ganda comedy
that you're watching or something.
Now, as you're in Esther chapter 1,
let me read you one verse from the Apocrypha.
Ecclesiasticus 1.1.
Not Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiasticus.
Or known as the book of Sirach as well.
And so it says in Ecclesiasticus 1.1,
this includes the prologue or the introduction to the book
as well as the first verse.
The prologue of the wisdom of Jesus the son of Sirach,
the same things uttered in Hebrew
and translated into another tongue
have not the same force in them.
Let me read that to you again.
The same things uttered in Hebrew
and translated into another tongue
have not the same force or power in them.
What is the Apocrypha saying?
Basically, God's word is in Hebrew and Greek,
and you can't know it in Hebrew.
If you translate it from Hebrew to another language,
it loses power.
That's what I said.
That's why I said this is not directly a King James only
sermon, but it helps us get an understanding of what
means being King James.
No, it has the same power.
God's word has the same power in English, Spanish, kapambang.
And it doesn't matter the language.
It matters the words.
And it says they don't have the same power, same force in them.
And not only these things, but the law itself
and the prophets and the rest of the books
have no small difference when they
are spoken in their own language.
What is he saying?
When he says there's no small difference,
he's saying it's a big difference.
That's what he's saying.
It's not a small difference.
No, it's a big difference when you go from Hebrew
to another language.
Basically, it's not even close to being the same.
So apparently, every single one of us in this room
need to learn Hebrew to understand the Old Testament.
And we need to learn Greek to understand the New Testament
according to the Apocrypha.
It's kind of interesting that you look at religion
that for most of their history, the services
were in another language.
Why?
Because according to what they believe, there's more power in it.
They don't want you to know what the word is.
That's why it's called the Dark Ages because you had no access
to the word of God.
You didn't even know it was being said in sermons.
You had no idea what you even believed.
You're just repeating these vain words that you don't even
understand.
That is what was going on in the Catholic Church
and that still goes on with a lot of Catholic Church.
And they have the services in some other language.
Why?
Well, there's just so much force in other languages.
Apparently, Latin's an exception as well.
Apparently, there's a lot of force in Latin
because that's what the services were.
But it says, have not the same force in them.
Well, notice what it says in Esther 1, verses 21 and 22.
Everything we believe, we prove from the Bible.
So let's see if the apocrypha is telling us the truth
or whether it's lying to us.
Esther 1, verses 21 and 22.
And the same pleased the king and the princes.
And the king did according to the word of the memucan.
For he sent letters into all the king's provinces,
into every province according to the writing thereof,
and to every people after their language,
that every man should bear rule in his own house
and that it should be published according
to the language of every people.
Every language is what it says.
Think in the Philippines when it says every province.
Some provinces, they speak Visayan.
Some provinces, they speak Kapampangi.
Some provinces, they speak all the other languages.
Different languages in their province.
So if it was in Kapampangi, it would be Kapampangi.
And the other areas that speak Visayan,
it would be in Visayan.
What the king is saying is, you know what,
I want it to be so specific that you get it.
I'm not gonna expect you to even read it in Tagalog.
Or English, no, let's put it in your language,
your number one favorite language.
We're putting it in that language.
That is what the Bible says.
That is what the king did in Esther chapter one.
He said, no, we're not just gonna go with this one language
that even probably most people spoke.
He said, I want it to be in their specific language
so it has that much power.
Because you're first in main language.
That's the language you pray in.
That's the language that you, when you're thinking,
that's what you're thinking about.
Look, it doesn't matter how good I get, you know,
one day speaking Filipino, whatever language.
I'm gonna be thinking in English my whole life
because as a baby, as a child,
I would just pray in the language of English
and say, my first language.
Right.
Your first language is gonna be your main one.
And what the Bible's saying is,
hey, put this language into your specific language
in your province.
So not even just Filipino or English,
but let's put it in your language from your province
because that's the best language to you.
Esther chapter three, Esther three.
And so we go forward in Esther chapter three
and in verse number 12, the Bible reads,
then where the king's scribes called on the 13th day
of the first month and there was written according
to all that Haman had commanded under the king's lieutenants
and to the governors that were over every province
and to the rulers of every people of every province
according to the writing thereof
and to every people after their language.
In the name of king that has awareness was it written
and sealed with the king's ring.
What do we see again?
It's in every language, after their language,
their specific and best language.
We're putting it into that language
so they can understand even better.
So basically he has experts at language saying,
let us translate it completely perfectly
from Tagalog to Kapampang.
Why?
Because people in Kapampang are gonna understand
that language even better and prefer that language.
So we're gonna put it in their language in their province.
Turn to Esther eight, Esther eight.
And so in Esther chapter eight in verse number nine,
the Bible reads, then where the king's scribes
call it that time in the third month.
That is the month of Siva and on the 320th day thereof
it was written according to all that Mordecai commanded
on to the Jews and to the lieutenants and the deputies
and rulers of the provinces which are from India
on to Ethiopia and 127 provinces
on to every province according to the writing thereof
and on to every people after their language
and to the Jews according to the writing
and according to their language.
127 provinces, he said, we're gonna put the word of God
in every single one of those languages.
Well, wouldn't it be a great thing if the word of God
was in every language in the world today?
I mean, it would be great if you could honestly
pick up a book and every night would say,
this is the word of God.
Unfortunately, we don't really have that situation
in our country.
There's no book I can confidently hold up right now
and say that it's the word of God in the Philippines.
Why?
Because there's obvious errors.
Even the one, the so many ones we use,
there's just verses that honestly just aren't right.
It's sad, but it is what it is.
Now, in English language though, what we believe
is that God's word, the King James Bible,
became in 1611 and it is perfect,
every single word exactly how God wanted it.
Turn to Daniel 4, Daniel 4.
Now, when it comes to the King James only topic,
maybe people in this room aren't that familiar with it
and honestly, we have a documentary we would recommend.
You can watch on YouTube that explains really in depth
and we'll preach through a series on it
and see everything like that.
What you have to understand is that the Catholic Church
did not want people to have the Bible.
And so basically, years went by, people were murdered
getting the Bible into the English language
and it was illegal and eventually,
when King James took the throne in England,
he started to put the Bible into the English language.
What happened to him?
Just less than a year later,
the Catholic Church tried to kill him.
They tried to kill him and they were unsuccessful.
The Gunpowder Plot and remember the 5th of November,
Gunpowder Trees and the Plot.
And so on November 5th, it's 1605, I believe it was.
November 5th, 1605, they tried to kill him
and God did not allow that to happen
because he wanted the word God to come into our language.
And so Guy Fawkes in the Gunpowder Plot,
it's still a holiday in Britain
and he's known as a bad person because he was a bad person.
He tried to kill but Daniel was trying to get us
the Bible into our language, into the English language.
Daniel chapter four, verse one.
Nebuchadnezzar the king unto all people, nations
and languages that dwell in all the earth,
peace be multiplied onto you.
Now let me ask you a question.
Does every single person understand the language
that is Nebuchadnezzar's first language?
No.
So what he's saying is into every language, every nation.
What he's saying is this decree
was put out into every language.
That's what we saw in the book of Esther.
That's what we see in the book of Daniel.
And you should say why?
Because ever since the power of Babel,
there have been a lot of different languages.
And quite honestly, if I'm trying to have a conversation
with someone who only speaks Mandarin Chinese,
it's not gonna be that easy.
We're not gonna understand each other.
And so unless something is in his language
where he knows it, then he's not gonna get it.
And if he writes something in Mandarin Chinese,
I don't know, how am I supposed to know that?
I don't speak Mandarin Chinese.
And so it's being put in every language.
This is just common sense that the word God
should be out in every language
and kings would put words into every language
in order for people to understand it.
Look, don't you see when you buy something,
they'll have instructions
and they'll have it in multiple languages?
You know why they put it in multiple languages?
They want people to understand the instructions
because if it's just in English,
not everyone's gonna get it.
If it's just in Spanish, not everybody's gonna get it.
So they'll put it into a lot of different languages
to try to get everybody to understand it.
That's common sense.
Even the world knows that.
And yet people say today, well, you know,
the Bible, you gotta go back to the Hebrew.
I mean, there's nothing magical about the Hebrew language.
There's nothing magical about the Greek language.
There is something magical about the words of God
and that can be put in any language.
Turn to Daniel chapter six, Daniel six.
And let's look at verse number 25.
Daniel six, verse 25.
And in Daniel chapter six, this is after Nebuchadnezzar,
and now we have King Darius.
And in verse 25, Bob Rizzi.
Then King Darius wrote unto all people, nations,
and languages that dwell in all the earth,
peace be multiplied on you.
I make a decree that in every dominion of my kingdom
men tremble in fear before the God of Daniel,
for he is the living God and steadfast forever,
and his kingdom now which shall not be destroyed,
and his dominion shall be even unto the end.
So throughout the Old Testament, you're seeing God's word.
It's being put in multiple languages.
This is something that was common for a king,
someone who's a leader.
You're gonna put the words you're speaking
into multiple languages so everybody understands it.
When you have empires like the Babylonian Empire,
the Persian Empire, you're conquering large areas
and people speak different languages.
So when you make decrees, you put it in multiple languages.
But when a country conquers, when Rome conquered the world,
not everybody spoke their language.
They started to put it in multiple languages
for people to understand.
Turn to the New Testament, Acts 2.
This is not just an Old Testament thing, though.
This is throughout the entire Bible.
I want you to notice in Acts 2,
starting at verse four where the Bible reads,
and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost
and began to speak with other tongues
as the Spirit gave them utterance.
Now, the Pentecostals have just kind of gone crazy on this.
They say, they spoke with tongues.
Does that mean they just, that's what a drunk person is.
They just babble, you know, not make any sense.
And when it says other tongues, it's saying other languages.
In Spanish, the word lengua is language,
but it also means tongue.
Lengua means both language and tongue.
And so when it's saying they spoke in other tongues,
it's referring to their language.
When you look throughout the Bible,
tongue refers to language.
Yes, it's a body part, but just like lots of words,
they mean multiple things.
And so tongue in the body is referring to a language
when you're seeing this here.
So it says with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance
So it's not a fake language or not babbling,
it's a real language they're speaking.
And they were dwelling in Jerusalem,
Jews, devout men out of every nation under heaven.
Now, when this was noised abroad,
the multitude came together and were confounded
because that every man heard them speak in his own language.
So basically the miracle that's taking place
is that everybody there, they hear the word of God
in their own language.
What it does not say is that everyone has the ability
to hear and understand Hebrew or Greek.
No, they heard it in their own language.
So if you like, if I'm preaching a sermon
and there's people here from Germany that only speak German,
they wouldn't have the ability to understand English,
they would understand in German what's being said.
And they're like, man, this guy is up here preaching
and I hear it in my language in German.
And people from all over the world were there
and whatever language they spoke,
that person heard it in their own language.
That's what's taking place here.
That would be a real good thing for so many, wouldn't it?
Right.
It's the reason why a lot of people got saved in Acts 2.
We had the ability to preach and then in every language,
you don't even have to think about translating stuff.
You can just say it to a group of people.
You can get somebody saved from China, Germany,
and France all at the same time.
And I'm hearing it in different,
wouldn't that be pretty cool?
You get somebody saved in Chinese, French, and German
all at the same time,
and you're just speaking your own native language.
That is what is taking place in Acts chapter two.
The miracle is not that they have the ability
to learn Hebrew or learn Greek.
You never see that.
Yeah.
And look, if you wanna learn Hebrew, you can go for it,
but it's gonna take you a lot of time.
That's something you literally need to count the cost.
Am I actually gonna finish this?
Because if you don't finish it, you just wasted time.
Right.
And so you're welcome to learn those languages,
but look, you don't need to learn Hebrew or Greek
to understand the Bible.
You can just read it in the languages you know.
In English, you can understand the word God.
So we do have a perfect Bible.
But according to the Apocrypha,
there's just no power in the English language.
The power is in Hebrew or Greek.
So my question is, if all the power is in Hebrew,
why did God allow that language to die off?
Because it doesn't even say Greek in that verse.
It said that things uttered in Hebrew.
Basically, if it's not in Hebrew,
it doesn't have the same amount of power.
So I guess the New Testament doesn't have any power
because it would be Greek.
Yeah.
Then why did God keep the language that just died out?
Look, the English language will not die out.
There's a reason why God put the word God
into the English language,
because it is the language of the people.
Do you know why the New Testament was written in Greek?
Because around the world,
guess what was the universal language that people knew?
Greek.
That is the language.
Why?
Alexander the Great conquered the world.
He wanted to be remembered forever,
and he set up libraries and language systems
so everybody would be learning Greek
in the areas they live.
And that is why Greek became the language of the world.
And because it was the language of the world,
God is not stupid.
And he says, wow, I want people to understand the word God.
So instead of putting it in Hebrew,
we're gonna put it in Greek,
because that is now the language people speak.
But guess what?
The Hebrew could be translated into another language,
the semi-perfect.
In today's world,
what is the language that is basically universal,
where in every country,
you're gonna find people that speak that language?
It's English.
There's no question about that.
And there's a reason why that in 1611,
God had his hands in the King James Bible,
and why there was a perfect Bible.
Now look, I believe we can put the Bible into any language,
and I think that would be a great project to do.
But we do have a perfect Bible, an English language.
If some other language became the big language,
and just passed English,
I promise you, God would put the perfect Bible
into that language as well,
because it's only logical.
That is the language that people around the world speak.
And so when the Apocrypha is criticizing
having it in a language that's not Hebrew,
it's basically undermining the ancient King James only.
And the Catholic Church wants that.
Now you might ask this question, Brother Stuckey,
why do we even have the Apocrypha in the Bible to begin with?
Because our modern-day Bibles do not have the Apocrypha.
But the King James Bible did have the Apocrypha in it.
And so it's a question you get asked,
well, why did God allow the Apocrypha,
why was it in the original Bibles to begin with,
if it is not God's word?
Well, I'll give you a couple reasons,
and I can't say 100% for sure,
but I want you to realize that,
as I mentioned at the beginning,
non-Christians have debated
whether or not the Apocrypha is Scripture.
Let me give you an example.
Martin Luther, an unbeliever, for many different reasons,
he said the book of James was not inspired.
The book of James, he said, that's my favorite book.
I said, are you kidding me?
But he said James too teaches work salvation.
He's like, you just don't understand either.
But James, he said, was not inspired.
He said the book of Jude was not inspired.
He said Esther, I think it was Esther, was not inspired.
He mentioned, I think, Hebrews as well,
where basically, at times in his life, he changed his mind.
Then there was this big council where, you know,
Christianity decided these are the 66 books.
And then all of a sudden, he just went along with it,
because everybody's just worshiping these councils,
because he was Catholic, he just went old school Catholic,
is what he believed in, okay?
Look, unsaved people debate about this stuff.
And you can look throughout history,
and there were councils all these years saying,
hey, is this book, is the book of Tobit inspired?
I think it is inspired.
Well, you're an idiot, if you think Tobit is inspired.
But they would debate about these books and say,
well, I think this is inspired, and I think this is.
Look, Christians never had to debate about it.
Because you can tell what's inspired and what's not,
if you're saved.
Unsaved people debate about stuff all the time.
I just saw yesterday, or the day before something,
I was doing some work, I was writing a sermon,
and sometimes when I write sermons,
if I know what I'm doing, it's just copy and paste,
I know what I'm looking for,
so I'll listen to something in the background.
And I saw on the YouTube feed recommended videos,
and James White was debating some other Calvinist
about whether or not we accept Catholic infant baptism
when they come and leave the Catholic church.
Look, unsaved people debate about whether or not
infant baptism from a Catholic church is valid.
Whereas saved people say, well, the Bible says
you must believe first, and the baby cannot believe.
Look, unsaved people debate about stuff all the time.
Saved people are not gonna debate about that.
Now, you have to understand, when the Bible was written,
not everybody who wrote the Bible
would translate it, it was saved.
In fact, I would say most of them probably weren't saved.
That doesn't mean that God's hand was not in that.
God allowed Balaam to speak in the Bible.
God allows unsaved people to do things, okay?
Now, I really have two main reasons
why I think that it might have been in the King James Bible.
Number one is, all the Bibles before that
had the Apocrypha in it.
It was a tradition that had just been passed down.
Now, they had the New Testament,
they had the Old Testament, and the Apocrypha separate, okay?
But it was kind of a tradition that was passed down.
The Geneva Bible, all those Bibles,
they had the Apocrypha in it.
Why, I really don't know.
But the other possibility is that saved people said,
you know what, there's this big debate
about Catholicism and Christianity.
It's not gonna be very hard to make.
They see the difference between the Old Testament
and the New Testament and the Apocrypha.
So quite honestly, I think saved people back then
didn't really mind, because it's like,
well, yeah, it's pretty obvious this shows
Catholicism is a joke, because it's telling you
to practice sorcery, whereas the Bible,
obviously, is not teaching that.
And so, you know, I don't necessarily know for sure.
I will say this, though, because I'll mention
in the sermon next week, the Apocrypha was not included
because it was historically accurate.
It was not historically accurate.
I've heard that for a long time.
I've believed that before, because you're always trying
to find ways to defend King James only.
That's what I always heard.
It was included for historical reference only.
The problem is, it's not historically accurate.
It's just a joke in that way as well,
which we're gonna see next week.
So honestly, the main thing I think is really just
that people that were saved just said, you know what,
it actually doesn't hurt us, because people are gonna see
a big difference between Christianity and Catholicism,
because everybody knew the Apocrypha
was part of the Roman Church.
They knew it was not something that the Anabaptists
and saved people believed in,
so it was gonna be very obvious to people.
Let's go to North America.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us
to be here today and just getting to see the difference
between your Holy Word and also the Apocrypha,
your false problem with the book, Scott.