It is a SAD and ILL-ADVISED position for ANYONE to take, when one RELIES on MAN instead of ALMIGHTY God, YHWH [Yahweh, traditionally rendered, Jehovah].
So then, one SHOULD NOT rely on minister, pastor ETC. for SPIRITUAL food, BUT RATHER on EVERY INSPIRED UTTERANCE from Jehovah God.
In the Book of Matthew, we read at chapter 4, verse 4: But in reply he said: "It is WRITTEN, 'Man must live, NOT on bread ALONE, but on EVERY utterance coming forth through Jehovah's mouth.'
Compare Deuteronomy 8: 3.
Jeremiah 17: 5 reads: 'Cursed is the able-bodied man who puts his TRUST in earthling man and ACTUALLY makes flesh his arm[strength], and whose HEART turns AWAY from
Jehovah himself.'
Verse 6 reads: And he WILL CERTAINLY become like a solitary tree in the desert plain and WILL NOT SEE GOOD when good COMES; but he must reside in parched places in the wilderness, in a salt country that is not inhabited.
For SURE, if one DOES NOT put his TRUST in God's words the Bible, but INSTEAD, would RATHER listen to MAN, then that one would be in a SPIRITUAL DROUGHT or WILDERNESS.
Not ONLY that, but WHEN good COMES, that one would NOT know. Hence if one believes in a FALSE DOCTRINE, because one DOES NOT SEARCH God's Word, the Bible, but INSTEAD relies on his/her pastor/minister, then EVEN when the TRUTH is mentioned to them they WOULD NOT KNOW.
Psalm 1: 1 - 3 : Happy is the man that has NOT walked in the counsel of the wicked ones, And in the way of sinners has NOT stood,
And in the seat of ridiculers has NOT sat.
But his delight is in the law of Jehovah,
And in his law he READS in an undertone DAY and NIGHT.
And he WILL CERTAINLY become like a tree planted by STREAMS of WATER, That gives its own FRUIT in ITS SEASON
And the foliage of which DOES NOT WITHER,
And EVERYTHING he does WILL SUCCEED.
Compare with Jeremiah 17: 7 - 8.
We SEE then, that the one who SEARCHES God's Word, the Bible, and APPLY it in his/her life WILL become SPIRITUALLY STRONG and WILL bear FRUITAGE of the spirit.
At Galatians 5 verse 22 we SEE the fruitage of a spiritual life being: LOVE, JOY, PEACE, LONG-SUFFERING, KINDNESS, GOODNESS, FAITH, MILDNESS, SELF-CONTROL.
HONEST-HEARTED persons THEN, should be EAGER to SEARCH the Scriptures for THEMSELVES as did those in Beroea as recorded at Acts 17: 11 which says: Now the latter were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with the GREATEST EAGERNESS of MIND, CAREFULLY EXAMINING the Scriptures DAILY as to WHETHER these things WERE SO.
May WE also, EXAMINE God's word the Holy Scriptures, DAILY.
The English scholar Isaac Newton, best known today for his many contributions to mathematics and physics, also wrote extensively on Biblical matters. In a 1690 treatise entitled An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture, Newton observed:
"In all the vehement universal and lasting controversy about the Trinity in Jerome's time and both before and long enough after it, this text of the 'three in heaven' was never once thought of. It is now in everybody’s mouth and accounted the main text for the business and would assuredly have been so too with them, had it been in their books."[9]
Newton's history of the Comma Johanneum reflects his belief that Church history was one of progressive decay from a pure original and that the Comma was introduced, intentionally or by accident, into a Latin text during the fourth or fifth century, a time when he believed the Church to be ripe with corrupti