Inconsequential Facts Are Very Relevant

“And John also was baptizing in Aenon near to Salim, because there was much water there: and they came, and were baptized.” (Joh 3:23 AV)

The word of God is amazing.  In many ways!  Prophecy is a wonder to behold.  Equal to prophecy are those passages of scripture written for future protection against textual criticism or misuse of the word of God.  Twice in three chapters, what seems like incidental facts turns out to be very important many centuries later.  Jesus defines Peter’s name as meaning ‘stone’ and not ‘rock’, as some would like it to mean.  This was written centuries before the passage in Matthew was first misused to support a pope.  Above is another example.  One criticism as to the accuracy of the Old Testament is the width of the Jordan river.  When Israel passes over the River Jordan, it is said the priests could not be seen while they stood in the midst of her because the heat of the desert hid them.  Along with other facts, it would seem as though the Jordan was around a mile wide.  Today, the River Jordan is not nearly that wide.  Where John baptized, the river is a mere 50 feet wide.  So, the critics would claim the Old Testament is inaccurate and not to be trusted.  However, the LORD, in His infinite wisdom, let us know the size of Jordan had shrunk dramatically from Israel’s crossing to John’s baptism.  We learn above that John went to a place of perpetual springs to baptize because there was insufficient water at Jordan.

Sometimes, you can predict a possible threat and play defense.  I know mice and rats are possible.  I live in a city.  I know squirrels are all over the place.  They can be destructive.  I know there is a criminal threat in my neighborhood.  Knowing all these things as a possibility, there are certain steps I can take.  I can block all means of access.  I can plug all the holes that might be used by rodents to gain entrance to my house.  I can secure all points of entry into my home to keep the criminal element out.  My catalytic converter was stolen twice in one month.  So, I had my mechanic weld rebar on the entire length of my exhaust system.  Haven’t had it stolen in three years.  We can freeze meat to keep it from going bad.  We can brush our teeth to keep cavities from forming.  We can eat right to stave off disease.  There is much we can do to protect ourselves against a predictable threat.  But all these things we do in a general sense.  In other words, I do not fill in all the access points to my house to keep out a particular mouse or rat.  I don’t keep the dumpster empty to ward off one particular squirrel.  I didn’t weld rebar on my exhaust system because I knew exactly who it would be that would try to steal it.  These things I did to ward off general and predictable threats.  This differs from the verse above.

The verse above was written for the express purpose of answering the critic’s objection two thousand years later.  I was watching a video from a biblical archeologist and he made the statement that the number of the Old Testament was incorrect.  He mentioned the oft used excuse that scribes made the error.  After all, haven’t you played the child’s game of gossip?  You sit around in a circle and someone whispers something in the ear of the person next to them.  It goes all the way around and the group laughs at the end product when compared to the original statement.  Obviously, preservation is impossible, right?  Wrong!  The word of God is perfectly translated and preserved.  There are no errors.  And if you try to invent one, the LORD already has a checkmate in place.  The River Jordan was a fraction of what it once was when John baptized there.  It would also stand to reason the Jordan briefly shrank to a trickle.  Otherwise, John would not have moved.  So, let God be true and every man a liar!  Amen!