Bible Must Be In Codex Format?

There are churches that insist that the Bible can only come in codex (that is book that we know so well) format. No handphone apps. Well, let us be very scriptural about this and look into the Bible for answers.

The Torah was first written by God on stone tablets (Exodus 24:12-31:18, Exodus 32:15-16, Exodus 34:1-28, Deuteronomy 10:1-4). The Torah, together with rest of the Old Testament were written in scrolls (Exodus 24:7, Deuteronomy 31:24-29, 2 Kings 22:8, 2 Chronicles 34:14-15, Jeremiah 36:27-28, Luke 4:16-20). The New Testament were still written in scrolls and parchment before the closing of the revelation (2 Timothy 4:13). It seemed that the Bible started to appear in codex only in the second century AD.

Therefore it seems right that we should follow the Bible strictly and use scroll. If we want to be more rigid, we will use stone tablets for the Torah. Not only we cannot use the handphone, we also cannot use the book form. Remember this - Jesus use the scroll. We must following Him, right?

Then there is this warning by Apostle Paul about wasting time in endless discussion of myths and endless genealogies (1 Timothy 1:4), which does not seem to apply to Bible scrolls, codex or apps. Should we take heed?

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. (Luke 4:16-20 ESV)

Oh, wait a minute. The above Bible passage quoted is from ESV. If KJV, then it would be "book" and not "scroll". So maybe we have to use the book format after all if we are using KJV only.

Below are two references on the technology of transmission of the Bible text:
From scrolls to scrolling: how technology has shaped our Bible reading - Articles about the Bible - Bible Society
Technology and the Transmission of the Biblical Text

Millennium - China vs Bible

習近平以"千年大計"來形容"雄安新區"。可是人不可能有"千年大計"。因為人的壽命太短。人生七十古來希。只有上帝才能有"千年大計"。因為上帝是自有永有的。
Reference: 千年大计带来千载机遇-新华网

Then I saw thrones, and the people sitting on them had been given the authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their testimony about Jesus and for proclaiming the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or his statue, nor accepted his mark on their foreheads or their hands. They all came to life again, and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years. (Revelation 20:4 NLT)

Facebook - My First Two Years

My first post was on 2008-07-31 Tang Poh Kok "is at work" My last post using this pattern was on 2009-02-26. Bible quotes were made without referencing to the Bible version. Maybe it was all from KJV.

On 2009-08-24, ‎Chia Tet Soon wrote,‎ "Hi Poh Kok, very interesting quotations and verses from the Bible. Are these part of your quiet time meditations?"
My response was, "Not really, mostly responses to something that happened."
After that, there was no more post for the rest of 2009 except for some photograph.

Here are the posts:
2008-07-31
is at work
2008-08-08
is at home
2008-08-10
is with the family
2008-08-12
is at home
2008-08-14
is at work
is at home
2008-08-26
is sleeping
is sleeping
2008-09-02
is sleeping at Federal Territory (KL)
2008-09-05
is sleeping at home.
2008-09-07
is sleeping in Federal Territory (Labuan)
2008-09-12
is sleeping in the office
2008-09-13
is at home, sleeping.
2008-09-14
(Psalm 127:2) It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.
2008-09-16
is trying to set up Wordpress Multi-user
is sleeping at home
Followed by photographs
2008-09-18
(Psalm 121:4) Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
2008-09-20
says "No more monkeys tickling my ears with their fur".
2008-09-21
(Numbers 6:24-6) The LORD bless thee, and keep thee: The LORD make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee: The LORD lift up his countenance upon th
(Zechariah 4:10) For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice, and shall see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. "These seven are the
2008-09-22
is sleeping in Jakarta
2008-09-28
is sleeping at home.
2008-09-30
is sleeping in office
2008-10-01
is not working today. It is children's day.
2008-10-02
is trying out wiki
2008-10-04
is going to attend a wedding
2008-10-05
is sleeping at home.
2008-10-06
is sleeping in the office
2008-10-11
has got his keyboard of his home PC to work again.
2008-10-12
is sleeping at home.
2008-10-28
had completed installation of Hyper-V Server with the help of Soe Hla Win.
2008-10-31
is sleeping in Jakarta
2008-11-03
sat on a taksi (taxi in SG, teksi in MY) to airport driven by Suherman. If it is Superman, I may get a free flight back, or maybe not, since I am not Lois Lane.
2008-11-10
is sleeping in the office.
2008-11-12
lost his ez-link card two days ago.
2008-11-13
is sleeping in Jakarta
2008-11-15
is sleeping at home.
2008-11-22
：「年難過，難過年，年年難過年年過，人怕死，怕死人，人人 怕死人人死。」
2008-11-24
is quoting (Romans 6:23) For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
2008-11-28
is sleeping at Hotel Meliá Kuala Lumpur
2008-12-03
is going to be on MC tomorrow.
2008-12-04
is on one day MC.
2008-12-05
"He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler. (Psalm 91:4)"
2008-12-06
is attending the wedding of his grand niece.
2008-12-08
is sleeping in West Malaysia.
2008-12-20
is sleeping at home, as usual.
2008-12-21
noted that on this day in 1954, PAP was inaugurated at a gathering of 1,500 people in Victoria Memorial Hall.
2008-12-22
is going back to work again. Zzzzz......
2009-01-08
quotes Matthew Henry (1662-1714) "Peace is such a precious jewel that I would give anything for it but truth".
2009-01-20
is quoting Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) "Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction".
2009-01-26
is reading "Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners" by John Bunyan.
2009-02-04
is attending JSM Bible Conference.
2009-02-05
is configuring some silly firewall.
2009-02-06
had finished the firewall configuration.
2009-02-21
quotes Psalm 89:48 What man can live and never see death? Who can deliver his soul from the power of Sheol? Selah.
2009-02-26
has made friends with a mosquito. "Yiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin!"
2009-03-27
My first MC for the year.
2009-04-14
Hey, what am I suppose to do with those hatching eggs?
2009-06-11
Looking for ushers and traffic controllers for coming Bible Conference
2009-07-02
Farewell Lunch (with photo)
2009-07-12
The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." (Psalm 14:1, 53:1)
2009-07-13
Successfully installed Server 2008 SP2 on Thinkpad T61
2009-07-17
Bomb blast in Jakarta at Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels.
2009-07-18
When children create new words, we correct them. When adults create new words, they go into the dictionary.
2009-07-19
Activists who support wrong causes are creating evil while thinking that they are doing good.
2009-07-21
Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help (Psalm 146:3).
2009-07-22
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth (Genesis 1:1).
2009-07-23
There is no chicken-and-egg problem in the Bible. The chicken came first. And that can also be deduced by logic.
2009-07-24
"Peace is such a precious jewel that I would give anything for it but truth" Matthew Henry (1662-1714).
2009-07-25
Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts (Proverbs 21:2).
The just shall live by faith Habakkuk 2:4, Romans 1:17, Galatians 3:11
Right belief leads to right values. Right values lead to right judgement. Right judgement leads to right action.
2009-07-26
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 1 John 1:1
2009-08-01
For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness (Romans 10:3)
But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (Matthew 15:9)
2009-08-16
The Bible is always right, but our interpretations of it may be wrong.

Asteroid 2019 OK

The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain ablaze with fire was hurled into the sea. So a third of the sea became blood, a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. (Revelation 8:8-9 CSB)

The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from heaven. It fell on a third of the rivers and springs of water. The name of the star is Wormwood, and a third of the waters became wormwood. So, many of the people died from the waters, because they had been made bitter. (Revelation 8:10-11 CSB)

An asteroid, named Asteroid 2019 OK whizzed past earth within a distance of 73,000 km on Thursday 2019-07-25. It was estimated to be 57 to 130 meters wide and was speeding towards Earth at 24 kilometres a second. The sudden appearance of the asteroid took NASA scientist by surprise. It was not detected until a few days before Thursday. If it hit earth, it would have done so with an energy over 30 times the atomic blast of Hiroshima, enough to destroy a large city.

On 2013-02-16 at 3:25 a.m. Singapore time (15-02-2013 19:25 GMT), an asteroid named 2012 DA14 past Earth at a distance of about 27,680 km above Indonesia.

We had two misses. But not to worry, in future, there will be two asteriods that will not miss. I am not sure if the scientists of that day will detect the two asteroids. But even if they did, they cannot prevent them from hitting earth.

Big Data And Block Chain

I like this description of Marxism, taken from this website, "George Gilder: Google is Having a Nervous Breakdown".

QUOTE
A lot of people don't really understand what Marxism was. The key error of Marxism was Karl Marx's belief that the industrial revolution of the 19th century was the final human attainment, a kind of eschaton that the problem of productivity and wealth creation had been solved forever. From then on, the only challenge would be how to distribute wealth, rather than how to create it.

Well, Google Marxism just repeats Karl Marx’s error with the new technology. Google believes that their AI artificial intelligence, their machine learning, their robotics, their algorithmic biology, their search, and their solutions constitute a new eschaton, a new final achievement of human beings that’s even more grandiose than Karl’s original vision and that the Google people imagine a singularity where the machines will eclipse human minds and allow all of the rest of us to retire on beaches and collect a guaranteed annual income, the new fashion in silicon valley while Brin and Page fly off with Elon Musk to some remote planet in a winner-take-all universe.
UNQUOTE

Karl Marx believe in social evolution. He thought that societies evolved from Slavery to Feudalism to Capitalism and finally to Communism. I didn't know that Google also thought that AI is the final frontier.

Photograph And Painting

The difference between a photograph and a painting is that the photograph is an image of a real situation but a painting can be fictional.

In a photograph, if you can zoom in the every individual, each have their parents and line of ancestry, and may have families and descendants. The grass on the field is of a certain species. But in a painting, especially a fictional type, there are no such details. This is the difference between truth and fiction.

A truth account may not contain details, but it may be possible to zoom into it via other sources. A fictional account is the source itself. It has no other verification.

In Cinderella, the fairy godmother turned a pumpkin into a carriage. There is no ground to debate whether she could have used a watermelon, or a grape instead.

In the Bible, you can actually try to verify whether the miracles described were possible. For example, in the parting of the Red Sea, God drove the sea back by a strong east wind. There are grounds to debate whether is this possible.

Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the LORD drove the sea back by a strong east wind all night and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. (Exodus 14:21 NIV)

A careful reading of the Bible showed that God of the Bible performed miracles differently from other gods. In fact, there is a website that asked why God does not heal amputees. In fact, Jesus did heal an amputee. When Peter cut off Malchus' right ear, Jesus touched his ear and healed him.

And one of them struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his right ear. But Jesus answered, "No more of this!" And He touched the man's ear and healed him. (Luke 22:50-51 ESV)

The miracles in the Bible are reasonable. It seemed to take care of the implementation process. Whereas miracles by other gods seemed fictional, like the fairy tale Cinderella. There is no requirement for implementation in reality.

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. (2 Peter 1:16 ESV)

All You Need To Do Is To Believe

By the grace of God, an earthquake caused a guy to ask the most important question anyone can ask in their life to the right person:
About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone's chains came loose. The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted, "Don't harm yourself! We are all here!" The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas. He then brought them out and asked, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" (Acts 16:25-30 NIV)

And he received the most correct answer - believe. That is all. Believe. Nothing else. No good works required. We are such great sinners that our works are completely unacceptable to God.
And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31 KJV)

Our work is a defilement to God.
If you make a stone altar for me, do not build it out of cut stones. If you use your chisel on it, you will defile it. (Exodus 20:25 CSB)
Our righteous acts are like filthy rags to God.
All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away. (Isaiah 64:6 NIV)
Our good works are not perfect. It cannot hold water.
"My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. (Jeremiah 2:13 NIV)
Our hearts are evil.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9 KJV)
Our motivation for good works is imperfect because our heart is evil.
The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. (Luke 6:45 ESV)
Salvation requires new birth and new body. This is beyond us.
Brothers, I tell you this: Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, and corruption cannot inherit incorruption. (1 Corinthians 15:50 HCSB)
Finally, salvation is the work of God. It cannot be done by humans.
It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God's mercy. (Romans 9:16 NIV)
Salvation belongs to the LORD; your blessing be on your people! (Psalm 3:8 ESV)
I, I am the Lord, and besides me there is no savior. (Isaiah 43:11 ESV)

Some pastors who preached against "Easy Believism". But salvation has to be easy. If it is any more difficult, nobody will be saved because we are such great sinners.

To be saved, all we need is to believe. But to believe is difficult because our hearts are deceptive and we do not know what we mean when we says, "I believe." Jesus used the parable of the sower to explain the deceitfulness of our hearts.

"Hear then the parable of the sower: When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path. As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty." (Matthew 13:18-23 ESV)

So many said, "I believe", added to church numbers, and then fall away. Then there are those who stayed but seems unfruitful. Then there are those who worked and became leaders and then fall away.

There are churches with a big crowd who claimed to be Christians but behaved like the world. But this should not be a reason for us to raise the bar for salvation. We cannot add to God's Word.

There are churches with small number of people because the pastor set standards of behaviour. They said they are preaching against sin. But I have been to a church which does not allow the congregation to read the Bible from their handphone and they can only use KJV. I cannot find any Bible verse that justify these standards. We cannot add to God's Word.

Salvation is easy. But assurance is difficult.

How do you know you are saved? You just need to ask this is the fundamental question, "Is my salvation based on what Jesus has done on the cross for me and not what I do?" If your answer to this question is "Yes", then you are saved.

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you - unless, of course, you fail the test? (2 Corinthians 13:5 NIV)

Then some quote me this verse:
You believe that God is one; well and good. Even the demons believe that - and tremble with fear. (James 2:19 NET)

So they said, "Believe is not enough."

Look at James 2:19 carefully. The demons believe that God is one. Of course they do. They can come in the presence of God (Job 1:6). A lot of other religions also believe that God is one.

But salvation is more than believing that God is one. Salvation requires the belief that God saves us from our sins and we cannot do anything to save ourselves. The demons know that God is one and that He will not save them. That is why they tremble with fear.

We need to have the same faith in God for our salvation as the demons have in God for their damnation.