The Bible: God’s Word or Man’s Word?

Posted by Dr. Jeff Kaplan, Senior Pastor of Shepherd of the Hills

 

Have you ever wondered why the Bible is considered truth as opposed to other religious writings?  Aside from fulfilled prophesy, there are other confirmations that the Bible was given to people from God so we may know Him.  If someone said to you, “You don’t actually believe that the Bible is inspired by God, do you?” How could you affirm something as ludicrous and inane as that? How would you respond?

 

Some people believe that part of the Bible is wise instruction from men and part of it is from God.  That’s a false theory known as the partial inspiration theory, and teaches some of the writers of the Bible are more inspired than others.  That position holds that the Bible only contains the word of God when it speaks to the reader in a meaningful way.  A liberal theologian named Emil Brunner is credited with saying, That which speaks to me is the Word of God and that which doesn’t speak to me isn’t the Word of God.  Some actually believe that Jesus’ words, which appear in red in a red-letter edition of the Bible, are more inspired than the rest of the Bible, including the words of Paul, Peter, or the other apostles.  On the contrary, the apostle Paul claimed that “all scripture is given by inspiration of God . . .” (2 Timothy 3:16).  It is not just those parts of the Bible that speak to us which are inspired, all scripture is inspired by God.

The intuitional or natural theory asserts that the writers of scripture possessed a high level of natural powers or ability similar to the Shakespeare and Mozart. The problem with this view is it reduces the Bible to being no more special than works, which were developed by a trained writer or composer.  The Bible is much more than an elevated level of literary genius that was exhibited by certain ancient people.  Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 2:13:  and we thank God constantly for this, that when you received the Word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as what it really is, the Word of God.

 

The dictation or mechanical theory claims that God dictated the Bible to the writers as an office manager would dictate a letter to his secretary.  This view suggests that the writers were completely passive instruments, like a laptop computer, and God pounded out His message to them.  To be quite fair, there were times when that was God=s method.  When Moses received the Ten Commandments, he received stone tablets, which were inscribed by the finger of God (Exodus 31:18; 34:1; Deuteronomy 9:10).  On other occasions, God told Moses and Jeremiah to write down certain specific words (Exodus 34:27; Jeremiah 30:2; 36:2).  Even with those exceptions, the Holy Spirit never overruled the vocabulary of human authors.  The erudite and astute apostle Paul used technical terms, while the less educated John used more simple expressions.  However, both men were equally inspired by God.

 

The content, conceptual, or dynamic inspiration theory falsely says that inspiration extends only to concepts or thoughts in the Bible, but not the very words of scripture, and that only the main thoughts of Bible chapters and paragraphs are inspired.  It purports that God’s Spirit gave the biblical writers great ideas but left it up to them and their natural abilities to come up with their own words.  However, accurate communication of thoughts requires an accurate communication of words.  Psalm 119:160 states this about the Bible the sum of thy words is truth.   Proverbs 30:5 asserts “every word of God is tested . . .”   It is every word and not just the thoughts that are inspired.

 

The spiritual-rule-only theory claims that the Bible is not accurate when it comes to matters such as history and science.  Such a belief is pious nonsense.  If the Bible makes scientific or historical statements that are false, then it certainly cannot be reliable when it makes spiritual pronouncements.  What kind of God would we have if He told the truth about spiritual matters but lied His socks off when it came to other matters?  Jesus refuted this position when he said to Nicodemus:  If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how shall you believe if I tell you heavenly things? (John 3:12).  The truth is that whatever God’s word addresses is true and never wrong regardless of the subject.

 

To summarize why we should believe that the Bible was inspired by God, I have analyzed three things:  First, biblical inspiration is clearly taught in the scriptures.  One of the most powerful verses that supports biblical inspiration is 2 Timothy 3:16  “all scripture is given by inspiration of God . . .”  That word for inspiration is theopneustos.  It literally means God-spirited or breathed out.  When we say that scripture is inspired, we are saying that God is the author of scripture and it is the result of God’s creative breath.