Rush City Baptist Church

The Inerrancy of Scripture Sunday, February 17, 2008   I would like to begin with a definition of inerrancy.  Inerrancy is the process in which God by His superintendence assured that the original writings were exactly what He desired as His word to us, then as a result they are inerrant, and are therefore infallible.  A key passage that supports this definition is 2 Timothy 3:16, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.”  In his systematic theology, Wayne Grudem writes, “The inerrancy of Scripture means that Scripture in the original manuscripts does not affirm anything that is contrary to fact.”   Now, there are numerous objections to inerrancy. Some Christians would believe that the Bible is only authoritative for matters of faith and practice.  Others say that the term “inerrancy” is a poor term because in ordinary usage it denotes a kind of absolute scientific precision that we do not want to claim for Scripture.  To add weight to their argument they remind us that we have no inerrant manuscripts (called autographs), therefore talk about an inerrant Bible is misleading.  But the following facts counter this argument.  For over 99% of the words of the Bible we know what the original manuscripts said.  Even for many of the verses where there are textual variants, the correct decision is often quite clear, and there are very few places where the textual variant is both difficult to evaluate and significant in determining the meaning.  Others argue that inerrancy overemphasizes the divine aspect of Scripture and neglects the human aspect.  But a reading of the Gospels reveals the individual personalities of the writers were left intact.  Read the two accounts of Jesus’ healing of a woman.  Mark wrote, “She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse” (5:26).  In contrast, Luke, a physician wrote, “And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her” (8:43).  A related term to inerrancy is the word infallibility.  This term describes the trustworthiness of Scripture, indicating that it can in no way lead us astray from true doctrine or practice.  If we deny inerrancy, a serious moral problem confronts us: If inerrancy is denied, we begin to wonder if we can really trust God in anything He says.  If we deny inerrancy, we essentially make our own human minds a higher standard of truth than God’s Word itself.  If we deny inerrancy, then we must also say that the Bible is wrong not only in minor details but in some of its doctrines as well.    In response to the declining definition of inerrancy a group of biblical scholars came together in 1978 and published the following statement on biblical inerrancy.  “God, who is Himself Truth and speaks truth only, has inspired Holy Scripture in order thereby to reveal Himself to lost mankind through Jesus Christ as Creator and Lord, Redeemer and Judge.  Holy Scripture is God's witness to Himself.  Holy Scripture, being God's own Word, written by men prepared and superintended by His Spirit, is of infallible divine authority in all matters upon which it touches: it is to be believed, as God's instruction, in all that it affirms, obeyed, as God's command, in all that it requires; embraced, as God's pledge, in all that it promises.  The Holy Spirit, Scripture's divine Author, both authenticates it to us by His inward witness and opens our minds to understand its meaning – Illumination.  Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God's acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God's saving grace in individual lives.  The authority of Scripture is inescapably impaired if this total divine inerrancy is in any way limited or disregarded, or made relative to a view of truth contrary to the Bible's own; and such lapses bring serious loss to both the individual and the Church.   Now we will turn our attention to Psalm 19 where David proclaims the inerrancy and infallibility of God’s revelation.  By observing the heavens under the dominating presence of the sun, David was moved to declare the splendor of God’s handiwork. By comparison, he then described the dominating influence of the law of the Lord that enlightened him.  He then prayed for complete cleansing so that his life would be acceptable to God.  This psalm, therefore, surveys both God’s natural revelation and his special revelation, which prompts the response of self-examination.   First we have the words of natural revelation (19:1-6).  As David gazed up into the sky his thoughts turned to God.  That wordless revelation told him a powerful message about the glory and greatness of his Creator.  Whether daytime or nighttime, an incessant message was being proclaimed to every nationality that existed on the face of the earth that a Supreme Being existed who created and controlled their world.  The purpose for this communication was to reveal to mankind the holiness of the Creator and their own sinfulness that created a great chasm between Creator and his creatures.  And since nature is a wordless communication, there is no language barrier.  The only barrier to this communication is a spiritual one.  The apostle Paul speaks of this spiritual barrier in Romans 1:18-20, “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For 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, so that men are without excuse.”  So whether you are flying in a plane above the clouds, or sitting on a remote lake in Canada, God is communicating his glory to you if you are listening.   It is interesting to note that out of all of God’s handiwork the psalmist chose to focus his attention on the sun.  This may be for polemic reasons because the ancient people of David’s day viewed the sun as a very important deity.  Israel inherited this tendency from the Egyptians following the exodus.  Because of that God gave them this warning in Deuteronomy 4:19, “And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars—all the heavenly array—do not be enticed into bowing down to them and worshiping things the Lord your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven.”  We also read in 2 Kings 23:5, “Josiah did away with the pagan priests appointed by the kings of Judah to burn incense on the high places of the towns of Judah and on those around Jerusalem—those who burned incense to Baal, to the sun and moon, to the constellations and to all the starry hosts.”  And finally we read in the book of Job, “If I have regarded the sun in its radiance or the moon moving in splendor, so that my heart was secretly enticed and my hand offered them a kiss of homage, then these also would be sins to be judged, for I would have been unfaithful to God on high” (Job 31:26-28).   Now David turns his attention to the words of special revelation (19:7-11).  In this section David uses synonymous parallelism to emphasize the importance of God’s Word. He makes six statements that begin with a term for God’s revelation, followed by an evaluation of that revelation, and completed with the intended result of that revelation.  First he says, “the law of the Lord is perfect” in that it is flawless, and without blemish like the sacrificial animals that the law demanded, with the result of “reviving the soul.”  Think of the Bible as spiritual CPR and spiritually health conscious person will spend considerable time in it as preventative medicine to be in good shape to handle the trials that will come.  Second, “the statutes of the Lord are trustworthy making wise the simple.”  In Wisdom Literature the “simple” refers to a person who is naïve and untaught.  He is not an idiot, nor one who cannot comprehend, nor a fool who despises wisdom.  Instead, he is an individual whose exposure to life and wisdom has been limited.  Because of inexperience he is gullible and easily influenced.  Third, “the precepts of the Lord are right” in that they conform to God’s perfect standards, with the result of “giving joy to the heart.” The reaction of joy comes when we put God’s Word to the test and it proves to be right.  Fourth, “the commands of the Lord are radiant giving light to the eyes.”  Fifth, “the fear” which describes the reaction God desires when His Word is read, “is pure” in contrast to the immorality of our fallen world, “enduring forever.”  And sixth, “the ordinances of the Lord are sure altogether righteous.”   This leads David to respond with self-examination (19:12-14).  He realizes the depth of his sinful depravity and what he is capable of doing.  He describes sins of ignorance and sins of arrogance.  Therefore he prayed that the words he spoke and thoughts he contemplated would pass the inspection of God.  That is why the time we spend in God’s word must be significant both in quantity and quality.  What we feed our minds will eventually determine our actions.