Taking a high view of Scripture

  • Gary Hvass
  • Mar 22, 2010

God is a personal God. He is not aloof or distant. Instead, he is alive and real, and he has all the traits of a living person. Having been made in his image, we have the traits of personhood because he is personal. As any healthy person does, He loves, grieves, and cares because he is concerned about relationships.

For persons to be in real relationships they have to communicate. Genuine dialogue has to happen. And our God has not been silent: He has revealed himself in many ways.

For instance, he has revealed himself to us through his creation. Paul said that “since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made” (Romans 1:20).  He has also personally spoken to and through prophets, kings and priests. This culminated in the ultimate revelation of himself in the person of Jesus Christ. The author to the Hebrews said that “in the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (1:1-2).

The Nature of Biblical Inspiration

We would not know about any of this unless God had inspired prophets and apostles to write these things down—and to do it in such a way that these words of men would be concurrently the words of God. Thus Peter said “that no prophecy of Scripture … was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20-21).  Paul called the Scriptures “God-breathed” (2 Timothy 3:16).

The debate today, as it has been over the last 100 years, is largely over the accuracy of the Scriptures: Did God superintend the human authors so that they wrote his words without error, or did they make mistakes?

Along with most evangelicals, I believe that the Bible really is the Word of God: no mistakes—completely trustworthy. Sometimes this is called the plenary, verbal inspiration of the Scriptures (plenary = all of it, verbal = down to the very words themselves). Another word often used to describe this belief is inerrant.

In holding to this view of Biblical inspiration, Christians like me have taken our cues from Jesus himself. Throughout his earthly ministry he regularly proclaimed “it is written,” calling the Bible “the word of God” (e.g. Mark 7:13). In John 10:35 Jesus said that “the Scripture cannot be broken.”  In another key passage he said, “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” (Mt. 5:18) “The smallest letter” is the Hebrew letter yōd, which looks like an apostrophe in English. The “stroke” he refers to is the smallest extension of a Hebrew letter. In English, it is what distinguishes the word Eat from Fat.

In summary, I can say along with theologian Carl Henry:  “The Bible as a whole and in every part is the word of God written.”

False Assumptions

Having said this, the following are some misconceptions that people draw from the above conclusions about the divine inspiration of Scripture:

  • That God verbally dictated His messages to the authors of Scripture. In superintending the biblical authors we have no indication that God did this, nor did he need to.
  • That the human authors were spiritual automatons while writing Scripture. The biblical writers composed their works according to their unique personalities and literary styles as they wrote under the Spirit’s guidance.
  • That our English translations are divinely inspired. The doctrine of inspiration applies only to the original manuscripts.
  • That there is nothing contrary to fact in the Bible. The Scriptures accurately record instances of dialogue where people were mistaken (e.g. Job’s false counselors).
  • That one still needs to obey the civil and ceremonial laws of the Old Testament. Christ and the apostles clearly taught that, with the coming of the New Testament age, these laws are no longer binding (Mark 7:19, Rom. 6:14).
  • That those who hold to such a view of the Bible are “literalists.” All Christians, conservative or liberal, recognize different literary genres and figures of speech.

The Witness from Church History

Some think that the concept of the inerrancy of the Scriptures is something that fundamentalists invented in the 20th Century. But read the following testimonies from key leaders throughout the history of the church:

Irenaeus: “The Scriptures are indeed perfect, since they were spoken by the Word of God and His Spirit.”

Gregory of Nyssa: “Whatsoever the divine Scripture says is the voice of the Holy Spirit.”

Augustine: “I have learned to pay them such honor and respect as to believe most firmly that not one of those authors has erred in writing anything at all.”

Gregory the Great: “Let it be faithfully believed that the Holy Spirit is the author of the book.”

Martin Luther: The “Holy Scriptures cannot err.”

John Calvin described the Bible as the “pure word of God” and as “the infallible rule of His holy truth.”

John Wesley, in addressing the rising rationalism of his time, proclaimed: “If there be one error in Scripture, there might as well be a thousand. It would not be the truth of God.”

Implications of Inspiration

If the words of Scripture really are the words of God, then what bearing does this have on our everyday lives? Along with the psalmist we should “meditate [on Scripture] day and night” (Ps. 1:2). It should be “a lamp to our feet and a light for our path” (Ps. 119:105). It is “more precious than gold” and “sweeter than honey” (Ps. 19:10). The psalmist asks, “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word” (Ps. 119:9). Jesus used the Scriptures to respond to the devil when tempted (Luke 4:1-13) and Paul included it in our spiritual armor (Eph. 6:17).

The author to the Hebrews proclaimed that “the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (4:12). And after Paul says that “All Scripture is God-breathed,” in 2 Timothy 3:16, he goes on to say that it “is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

For more information on this, listen to the featured podcast by Dr. Gordon Hugenberger of Park Street Church in Boston entitled “Evidence for the Trustworthiness of Scripture” at www.soulzoneministries.org.