WTY-6 Is the Bible Inspired?

CHAPTER VI IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? In our days the inspiration of the Bible is a much-talked-about sub­ject. Nevertheless, great ignorance is manifested as to what is meant by in­spiration. The doctrine is not so dif­ficult and perplexing a matter. It must only be reverently approached. Childlike faith must be sustained as to the utterances of God’s word. Then all is simple and plain.

Definition of Inspiration

Inspiration is not revelation. Rev­elation is the direct impartation of God’s truth to the mind of a prophet. Inspiration is the impulse to make known what has been imparted, and the assistance afforded in the utter­ance of God’s truth, or in the record­ing of what God chose to have committed to the sacred pages. Some Old Testament men were granted revela­tions, but they were not induced to record them; they lacked the inspira­tion. In Moses both experiences met. Having received revelations, he was also inspired to make an infallible record of what God chose to have writ­ten for our instruction in righteous­ness.

Inspiration must also be disting­uished from illumination. “God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined” in the heart of every Christian, “to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6) But not every Chris­tian is inspired. Only a few men, the writers of both Old and New Testa­ment, were inspired, while millions upon millions were illuminated. One easy way to distinguish between inspiration and illumination is this: Illumination is subject to degrees, in­spiration is not; one Christian may be more illumined than another, but no Biblical writer excels another in inspiration. Nor must inspiration be con­founded with mere human genius. The latter is merely a natural quali­fication. One man towers over an­other in gifts, in talents, faculties, capabilities; but all these are natural powers. Inspiration is supernatural throughout. Human geniuses never agreed; the authors of the various books of the Bible all agree most wonderfully. To define then: Inspiration is a dy­namic divine influence coming upon both Old and New Testament writers, moving, urging, directing, enabling them to reduce to writing in God-sug­gested words, all those things which God chose to have recorded. The ob­jective point of inspiration is not the author but the book, not the writer but the writing. The words inscribed upon the sacred pages are God’s words. Some two thousand times we read in Scripture the phrase, or its equivalent, “Thus saith the Lord!” The human authors are but the hands, the amanuenses, of the Spirit.

“But,” says someone, “is not man’s personality thereby suspended, de­stroyed, encroached upon?” By no means. Though the instrument of the Spirit, the inspired man is more than a typewriter operated by an author. The prophets and apostles, far from being reduced to the level of mechanical pieces of machinery, sus­tained an elevation of their person­ality, and absorbedly participated with God. Was the personality of Moses annulled, undone, annihilated, when on the brink of the Red Sea he stretched out his hand and parted the waters? Indeed not! But the power employed was God’s. In the same way, when later committing to writing Jeho­vah’s revelation he moved his hand upon the parchment, but the words that were penned were God’s. Not­withstanding, his whole soul was en­gaged in the work.

We have proof of the plausibility of such union of the divine agency and the human in the fact that it con­forms so entirely to God’s usual method of operation. It is in God that we “live, and move, and have our being yet in giving us life, breath, and being, He does not interrupt the regular exercise of our own natural powers, but rather sustains them.

Again, the conversion and sancti­fication of the soul is the work of God; but who would say that in them man’s personality suffers annihilation. So in the matter of inspiration, God supervises, assists, restrains, sug­gests, and does all in His power that that may be recorded which is accord­ing to His will, and yet the human author thinks with his own mind, ex­ercises his own faculties, and speaks or writes according to his own method and style.

Necessity of Inspiration

We need inspiration. Objectively we need it to assure ourselves of the stability and certitude of revelation. It is not enough that at certain pe­riods of the history of the world God has vouchsafed revelations to the human race. They must be recorded, so that later generations may have a “sure prophetic word.” Oral traditions are not trustworthy records. We all know this from experience. Every society, congregation, organ­ization has its protocol, so that there may be no doubt as to proceedings of the past. So also with the facts of revelation. If they were not reduced to writing, who and what would attest their ver­ity? There would be no rock upon which to plant the feet. Consequent­ly, revelation imperatively involves and postulates the sacred writings and must be in operation till their completion, just as an important en­actment of legislature is not complete until recorded. So important is the authentic formulation of a code of laws that it is not left to the report­ers, though they may be honest and capable men, but it is framed by the legislators themselves, formally adopted, and attested by their signa­tures.

Thus with the Bible. God Himself is the author of it. His providence attended its construction from Gene­sis to Revelation. The threat con­tained upon the last page of the Scrip­tures is applicable to all its separate books and parts: “I testify to every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book. If any man shall add unto them, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book; and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life, and out of the holy city, which are written in this book.” The inspiration of the Bible is necessary not only objectively for the stability and security of the revela­tion, but also subjectively as a guarantee and pledge of the dependable­ness and sufficiency of our faith for salvation. The sum total of our faith is justi­fication by faith in Christ. How do I know that God has pronounced me guiltless and declared me just? May I rely upon my feelings, the inner joy and happiness that are mine? What if they fail? Would it be safe to stay one’s heart on such unstable, change­able inner experience?

No. As soon as my faith begins to reflect and inquire as to its ground and foundation, an authentic, codified revelation is demanded. Again, when doubts and difficulties arise; when the way seems rugged and steep, and the darkness is gathering fast; when temptations confront and peace seems banished from the heart; then some­thing more is needed than the by-gone subjective experience. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and des­perately wicked.” We need the solid objective declaration of Scripture that we are “justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” The Fact of Inspiration From beginning to end the Bible asserts its inspiration. To Moses God said: “Now, therefore, go, and I will be with thy mouth, and I will teach thee what thou shalt say” (Exodus 4:12). David asserts: “The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and His word was in my tongue” (2 Samuel 23:2). To Isaiah Jehovah says: “I will put My words in thy mouth” (Isaiah 51:16). And to Jeremiah: “Thou shalt be as My mouth” (Jeremiah 15:19). Likewise Eze­kiel is addressed: “Thou shalt speak My words unto them” (Ezekiel 2:7). So all the Old Testament writers make it plain that they are but the mouth­pieces and the penmen of God. Not less emphatically do the writ­ers of the New Testament assert their inspiration. “I certify to you,” says Paul, “that the gospel which was preached of me was not after man; for I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it but by the re­velation of Jesus Christ” (Galatians 1:11). And again: “Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual words” (1 Corinthians 2:13).

Thus the apostle could write be­cause Christ said: “I will give you a mouth and wisdom which no adver­sary can gainsay or resist.” “When He, the Spirit of truth is come, He shall guide you into all truth.” “When they shall deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak; for it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.” The most unique argument for the inspiration of the Old Testament is the relation which Jesus Christ bears to it. There is no escaping the issue that He receives it wholly as the word of His Father. So did His disciples. “We have a sure prophetic word,” cries one; while another exclaims: “Al1 Scripture is given by inspiration of God,” and a third “God, who at sundry times and in diverse manner spake in time past by the prophets, hath in these latter days spoken unto us by His Son.”

If language such as this does not prove the inspiration of the Bible, no language can. The Position of the Early Fathers The early fathers—the immediate successors of the apostles, all believed in verbal inspiration. I adduce the testimony of a few:

Clement of Rome says in his first epistle to the Corinthians: “Give dili­gent heed to the Scriptures, the true saying of the Holy Ghost.”

Justin Martyr declares: “I think not that the words which you hear the prophet speaking are uttered by himself. Being filled with the Spirit, they are from the divine Logps which moves him.”

Origen asserts: “The sacred books breathe the fulness of the Spirit. There is nothing, neither in the Law, in the Gospels, or in the Apostles, which did not descend from the ful­ness of the divine Majesty.”

Gregory the Great opines: “It is needless to inquire who wrote the book of Job, since we may surely be­lieve that the Holy Ghost was its author.”

Conclusion

Let us study the Scriptures—the time spent with them is time well spent. “Do you know a book that you are willing to put under your head for a pillow when you lie dying?” cries Joseph Cook, the great Boston lecturer. “That is the book you want while you are living. There is but one such book in the world!” That book is the Bible!

“The most learned, acute, and dili­gent student cannot, in the longest life, obtain an entire knowledge of this one volume. The more deeply he works the mine, the richer and more abundant he finds the ore; new light continually beams from this source of heavenly knowledge, to direct the conduct, and illustrate the work of God and the ways of men; and he will at last leave the world confessing, that the more he studied the Scrip­tures, the fuller conviction he had of his own ignorance, and their inestim­able value.” (Walter Scott.)