If you click on “What we Believe” on the website (www.gracefortoday.org) of New York City preacher Dennis Kiszona’s church (representing the metropolitan area’s sole mid-Acts dispensationalist assembly), it reads, “The entire Bible--all 66 books--in its original writings is verbally inspired of God and is of plenary authority (II Tim. 3:16,17; II Peter 1:21).”

Kiszonas, a big name within Berean Bible Society and a former associate of Jordan from the ’80s when C.R. Stam still ran the organization, is a New King James follower who does not believe in the inerrancy of the King James Bible and thinks only the original manuscripts can be viewed as perfect Scripture.

In other words, he doesn’t accept the fact that God’s design for the preservation of His word down through the ages has been through the use of copies.

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Acts 8:37 (which reads, “And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God”) is purposely left out of every modern bible translation on the market today.

As Jordan says, “They either leave it out completely or they put it in brackets, meaning they don’t think it ought to be there but they don’t have the courage of their convictions, so they put it in with brackets around it just to make sure you know they don’t think it ought to really be there! The verse is attacked simply on the basis of the fact that the faith of the man (in the passage) was generated by a copy of Scripture; he was reading a copy of the book of Isaiah.”

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In Acts 8, there are actually two different instances of a copy of Isaiah being used.

“Go to Acts 8:26 and you see this bird’s got another copy of Isaiah,” says Jordan. “What’d he do, go up to Nazareth and steal one from up there?! You know better than that; he had his own copy of the thing. That’s at least two copies. There’s one in Nazareth and then this guy’s got one.”

From verse 29, we even see that the Holy Spirit, talking about a copy of Isaiah, calls it Scripture.

Jordan says, “Obviously the accuracy and authority of the Bible extends far past the originals but goes into generations of copies. Christ could hold it and call it Scripture.

“When Jesus said, ‘It is written that man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God,” that expression ‘it is written,’ if you want to learn something from the Greek language, that’s in the perfect tense, which is a tense that means it’s accomplished in the past but the results continue on into the present. He’s saying, ‘It stands written right this minute! What God wrote down in the past continues to exist into the very present!’

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II Timothy 3:15 reads, “And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.”

The word holy means “set apart”; in other words, the Scriptures God has set apart for Himself. Obviously, Timothy knew them by a copy of the Bible!

Jordan says, “God says in Psalm 60 that ‘these are the words I have spoken in my holiness.’ That’s why you call it a Holy Bible! They’re the holy words of God and these Scriptures God has set apart for Himself!

When II Timothy 3:16 says, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God,” we know simply by the context it’s a reference to copies and not the original manuscripts.

Jordan reasons, “That’s a rough verse, folks, if you’ve got an unscriptural definition of inspiration or preservation! You can’t believe what that verse says! If you believe inspiration is just what happens to the writer when he writes some things down, and you don’t understand that inspiration has to do with the w-o-r-d-s God puts on a page . . .that’s the whole issue in inspiration, isn’t it?!

“The scholars and all the commentaries say the Septuagint (the corrupt translation used for the modern versions) is written in 250 A.D. and that Christ, Peter, Philip, Paul and Timothy—that everybody was not using a Hebrew Bible; they were using a Greek translation. So, if that’s true, that makes (II Tim. 3) even worse because there you’ve got a translation called Scripture! And they get mad at you if you say you believe your English translation is inspired!

“There, by their own standards, they have Paul saying that Timothy’s Greek translation is inspired! See, if a fellow will tell you he believes that’s a Septuagint, then you’ve really got him over a barrel! The Septuagint is a hoax and not a reliable thing to trust in, but if a man thought it was, you’d really have him!

“God’s design is to preserve His Word through a multiplicity of accurate, reliable copies that are available to all Believers and which are as authoritative as the originals. Therefore, you don’t have to go out and restore the original manuscripts; you don’t need the textual critics and their philosophy—their human viewpoint—of restoration.”

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Here’s a great passage from grace preacher D. Kuepper, taken from a study he gave at Shorewood Bible Church’s 1999 summer conference:

“What people do today, and what they’ll do in the last days of prophecy, is express ridicule and mockery in a language of contempt. Notice as we saw in II Timothy, though, it’s done in the midst of a ‘form of godliness.’ In the form of religion.

“Religious people will be the most guilty as to what’s happening here. And that’s why as we look at the perils of the times of the last days described in II Timothy 3, we need to remember that the Apostle Paul’s inspired words—you notice they don’t refer to economic problems, or riots, or war or even natural disasters?

“As we look at this passage dealing with the last days of the mystery—literally our last days of the Body of Christ as we wait for the Rapture—the real peril here is not inflation, it’s not depression, it’s not a third world war, it’s not an earthquake or hurricane…the real peril lies in the heart of man and that’s why we need to continue to preach the Cross according to the pure gospel of God’s grace, not only so men will be saved to glorify God in whatsoever we do—the very reason we exist—but also that we will glory in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake.

“We have that blessed hope and the message that tells of that blessed hope so that no matter how perilous these last days can be . . . ”