Can two walk together, except they be agreed?, Amos 3:3.
I once heard Dr. Peter Ruckman say that he never broke fellowship with anyone, they broke fellowship with him. I am learning that lesson. For each and every one of the brethren that I meet I have two thoughts; "Can this man teach me something?", and "Can this man be taught?".
It has been my joy and to my profit over the years that men out of diverse camps, and training different from my own have had much to teach me, and many of them have learned from me. Those who have profited me were not always doctrinal King James Bible believers. By that I mean that their doctrines and practice were just as apt to come from commentaries and supposed nuggets from Greek and Hebrew as from the pure word of God.
Yet, if what they taught me was verifiable from within the pages of a King James Bible I received that teaching. If what they said differed from the plain text of a King James Bible, I politely filtered it out of my reckoning. At all times the exact words of a King James Bible were my standard for judging, not the opinions of the brethren concerning the historical faith. To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them, Isaiah 8:20.
I have used the analogy of using a compass to find true north as opposed to finding the North Star and reckoning therewith. Were a companion and I to start a journey from the equator to the North Pole, he using a compass and I using the North Star with which to navigate, we can walk together for a long time. Eventually, his compass will pull him towards the magnetic North Pole which is hundreds of miles from the actual North Pole. The closer we get to true north, the more we will pull apart. He is using an earthly guide, I am using a celestial guide. We can no longer walk together.
So is it when a man is not convinced that a King James Bible is perfect. As we draw close to the sides of the north, the city of the great King, Psalms 48:2, my companions who rely on groping towards truth by peering through a glass darkly (1st Corinthians 13:8) will begin to pull away. Their earthy reckoning will search through earthy men's opinions of Greek and Hebrew, and commentaries that are convenient for their pre-established opinions. Inevitably they will side with the safe opinions of the crowd with which they run.
I will hold my celestial bearing and my King James Bible will do what it has done over and over, it will be used by the Holy Ghost to lead me into all truth; Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth, John 16:13. The Holy Ghost will never disagree with the King James Bible. He will never teach a doctrinal truth that is at variance with the literal words of a King James Bible when taught in context, keeping in mind to whom they are written and for when they are written. Any spirit that teaches otherwise is a devil or worse, it might be the deceived heart of the reader.
Knowing and practicing that simple truth has not lead me into a tiny clutch of like minded brethren huddled in a small conclave smug in our superiority. I grieve when I run across such. Such brethren do much to bring dishonor upon such truth as they may have. Instead, I pastor a thriving church wherein is much joy and many who can praise the God of Israel for true conversion that brings holiness and happiness in their homes and in public.
Even my critics have to acknowledge that the miracle of the new birth is manifest in changed lives when they visit us. They also acknowledge that such changed lives are rare to non-existent in the churches they visit that harmonize more closely with the doctrines and practices with which they are most comfortable. As I have frequently said, we are seeing the last generation of Baptist Fundamentalism.
They are no longer reproducing. They build their churches by attracting similar minded people from other churches and then conforming them to their own practices and pet doctrines. The art of garnering a congregation out of a general population surrounding their particular church is for all intents and purposes dead. Let this be clear, unless they repent and bow their stubborn hearts to the exact words of a King James Bible, such works as they have will go up in smoke. Their conclaves will rot into the folly of all dead churches.
That is not to say that my doctrine is perfect. I have brethren who from within the words of a King James Bible have convinced me of error. Gladly, I have changed my mind. From within that small cadre of true King James Bible believers there are often divergent thoughts as to how a verse should be applied to doctrine. I may differ with such brethren, but they are differences that I can respect because I know that each side of the disagreement is using one and only one standard for agreeing upon any truth. We all believe a King James Bible.
Recently, I received a phone call from an aged man who has been an honored guest at our yearly gathering called Youth Week. His reputation has been wrongly impugned nationally and even by his own kin. We have spent more money on him and his dear wife than any other guest that we have invited. Conversely, when I reflect upon the other 170 people who showed up for our gathering, I can say in good faith that none of them were drawn by using his name to lure in visitors.
He called to break fellowship. Being a man of excellent character, he was kind but firm in stating his need to part fellowship. In short, he broke fellowship over ours and many men's stand that when Jesus Christ was made sin for us, that when he was made a curse, and that when he was made a worm and no man, the wrath of God poured out upon him was not satiated by his physical death alone, but by his soul itself being made an offering for sin and by it then suffering the consequences of every other offering for sin mentioned in the bible.
I have brethren who from within the pages of a King James Bible disagree that the soul of Jesus Christ tasted the torments of hell and then was delivered by God the Father before the day was over. I disagree with such brethren, and I find very little value in trying to debate them through Facebook or other such forums. I have a confidence that if they were to ever sit with me and we were to open our bibles together, they would have to either accept such as fact or turn their faces from the exact words of the bible itself.
My friend breaking fellowship could not do that. The gulf is too great. I believe every word in a King James Bible and he does not. He thinks that many words are poorly translated. I know that every word is perfect. His compass points hundreds of miles away from the city of the great King. Mine points directly at it.
I am troubled over those who troubled him. My doctrine has never been hidden. In fact, I can go back through the years that he has been here and and listen to messages where that very doctrine has been clearly stated. What changed is that ill mannered brethren sat him down and made him listen to an entire message wherein I clearly state these matters. Using the same old pernicious habits of God-grieving Fundamentalists, they forced him to break fellowship with me in order to retain their fellowship. They zealously affect you, but not well; yea, they would exclude you, that ye might affect them, Galatians 4:17.
How has this affected me or my ministry? As the late Sammy Allen was wont to say, "I haven't needed to take even a half of a baby aspirin to get to sleep". My fellowship with the man never attracted a single visitor to one of my services. His use of Greek and Hebrew within his messages was something that I emplored my people to longsuffer. It will save my church a few thousand dollars a year.
What we lost was the chance to honor an old saint of God when so many had turned against him. I had the power within me when he called me to tell him of all those with whom he currently fellowships who also believe as I do. His circle of supporting churches would shrink drastically. That would force him to confine such ministry as he has to those dying churches who have had the joy and life sucked out of them, those churches wherein soul winning is only a statistic and not a visible reality.
To those men who sought so diligently to turn this man from our fellowship, I can only wish them the fruit of their labor. This will not be good. They were cruel to this man. They preyed upon his disinclination to trust a King James Bible in full. Their victory was to isolate just one of his many supporters and to force him to let that go. They gained nothing for that man. They hurt us not at all. In their fury that their biblical ignorance would not allow them to patiently refute what we showed them, they gnashed upon us with their teeth by seeking to divide friend from friend.
They mistake attendance figures and professions of faith for the work of the Holy Ghost. They are carefully separating themselves from those men and those doctrines with which the Spirit of the Living God has been pleased to awaken so many in our community and to imbue them with the faith of Jesus
Christ and the joy that comes from such.
My real crime is that I believe every word of a King James Bible. If I err, gladly will I see this if someone would be so kind as to patiently refute me from within the text of that book. If you chose to capriciously retranslate words in accordance with your doctrine, that is your privilege. Just don't be surprised if it moves me not at all.
As an addendum; please don't be so ignorant as to quote, "it is finished" from John 19:30 to refute the full atonement of Jesus Christ. When he said it, he was still alive, had not resurrected from the dead, and had not taken his blood into heaven. Unless you are so crass as to pretend that none of those things matter, quit applying John 19:30 to the atonement.
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death, James 1:15. Sin was finished with Jesus Christ in John 19:30. He was made to be, sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him, 2nd Corinthians 5:17. When sin was finished, it brought forth his death. Then God the Father had his way with sin. That was not pretty, but when it was over, Jesus Christ was risen from the dead and alive for evermore. The blood of Jesus Christ was on the mercy seat in heaven. Sin and death were defeated.
By this, I and those converted under my ministry have eternal life in Christ Jesus. Unlike our critics' flannelgraph Jesus, the King James Bible identifies Jesus as the true Christ and his work as all sufficient.