Dead souls leading dead churches

"As Dean Burgon (1883) pointed out, the history of the New Testament text is the history of a conflict between God and Satan. Soon after the New Testament books were written Satan corrupted their texts by means of heretics and misguided critics whom he had raised up. These assaults, however, on the integrity of the Word were repulsed by the providence of God, who guided true believers to reject these false readings and to preserve the True Text in the majority of the Greek New Testament manuscripts. And at the end of the middle ages this True Text was placed in print and became the Textus Receptus, the foundation of the glorious Protestant Reformation.

"But Satan was not defeated. Instead he staged a clever come-back by means of naturalistic New Testament textual criticism. Old corrupt manuscripts, which had been discarded by the God-guided usage of the believing Church, were brought out of their hiding places and re-instated. Through naturalistic textual criticism also the fatal logic of unbelief was set in motion. Not only the text but every aspect of the Bible and of Christianity came to be regarded as a purely natural phenomenon. And today thousands of Bible-believing Christians are falling into this devil's trap through their use of modern-speech versions which are based on naturalistic textual criticism and so introduce the reader to the naturalistic point of view. By means of these modern-speech versions Satan deprives his victims of both the shield of faith and the sword of the Spirit and leaves them unarmed and helpless before the terrors and temptations of this modern, apostate world. What a clever come-back! How Satan must be hugging himself with glee over the seeming success of his devilish strategy." - Edward F. Hills, The King James Version Defended

The denial of the supernatural really is a blatant main, no longer denied or attempted to be hidden, part of the approach of most Christian leaders and educators and academics in general. I mean, it's right there in the open with everything they say and write.

Also, in the above quote, these same types will say, "So...how does that follow?!?" when Hills writes: "And today thousands of Bible-believing Christians are falling into this devil's trap through their use of modern-speech versions which are based on naturalistic textual criticism and so introduce the reader to the naturalistic point of view." It happens this way: when your general approach is to look down on the word of God as if it were a mere document, no different than any other document from the past; when you decide that the word of God needs you (to determine what it is, to construct it) more than you need it; when you are no longer looking up to it as something higher than you, then you slowly (or quickly) slip into the naturalistic point of view that Hills mentions.

Think of it this way: there is one set of manuscripts, one English Bible version that your fallen nature hates the most. It is the one that forces you to look up to it, to receive it, to value it as something higher than you. That is the one that is the pure and whole word of God. Go against your fallen nature and value that Bible. It's been preserved - supernaturally - for you. Don't reject it.

One last point: these people will say, "The Received text needs to be edited too!" Answer them: there is a difference between editing a received stream of manuscripts that are from the same source vs. constructing a 'bible' from manuscripts that are from diverse streams and sources.

The deadness and heresy and shallowness in the visible churches today derive from a hatred of the Holy Spirit and the word of God. To paraphrase Goethe, modern day Christian leaders and educators wouldn't know the devil if he had them by the throat. (Which he does, and by other places as well.) The ones who adopt the name Calvinist, and Reformed, for instance, think they are being orthodox and on-the-mark, yet their hatred of God's sovereignty in regeneration ("God," they say, "we'll give you sovereignty in creation and providence...but sovereignty in grace is going too far. We'll let our ordained clerics and ritual see to that. Sorry, God.") and their hatred of the biblical doctrine of regeneration (being born again) itself, which goes along with their hatred of the pure and whole - received - word of God is what makes them dead souls leading dead churches.