From today, I trust in God to share A SERIES OF
LESSONS ON “The Uniqueness of the Bible”. To begin our
study let us open our Bible to the second Peter, I would like for you to follow
with me as I read from chapter 2: verse 19 to 21, that we might have the
scriptural understanding of the Majestic Mystery of “GREAT BOOK THAT HAS EVER
BEEN WRITTEN”.
“We also have the
prophetic message as something completely reliable, and you will do well to pay
attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and
the morning star rises in your hearts. Above all, you must understand that no
prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation of things.
For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though
human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Peter
1:19-21NIV.)
INTRODUCTION:
President George Washington, First President of the
United States, When he was sworn into office as the first elected
President of the United States on April 30, 1789, he added these words to his
own oath he had just taken: "So help me, God." He then reverently
stooped down and kissed the Bible used in the oath. He recognized the value and
importance of the Bible in national life and said “It is impossible to
rightly govern the world without God and Bible.”
The Bible is clearly the most influential book the world has
ever known. Whether you accept and believe in its teachings or not, it
cannot be denied that the Bible is the most remarkable, amazing and absolutely
UNIQUE book that has ever been written! Abraham Lincoln called it "the
best gift God has given to man." Patrick Henry said, "It is worth all
other books which were ever printed." Noted British statesman William
Gladstone wrote that "an immeasurable distance separates it from all
competitors" while the famous philosopher Immanuel Kant declared, "The
Bible is the greatest benefit which the human race has ever experienced."
A. M. Sullivan observed, "The cynic who ignores, ridicules, or denies the
Bible, spurning its spiritual rewards and aesthetic excitement, contributes to
his own moral anemia."“There is no other book so various as the Bible or
one so full of concentrated wisdom. Whether it be of law, business, morals,
etc…. He who seeks for guidance may look inside its covers and find
illumination.” (Herbert Hoover)W. E. Gladstone said “I have known
ninety-five of the world’s great men in my time and of these eighty-seven were
followers of the Bible.
While many think our modern world is founded on secular
ideals, it is in fact the Bible which had a greater influence and legacy. The
Bible not only influenced the language and its literature more than any other
book, it was also the activator of radical shifts in society to the abolition
of many evil practices from the society. Hence any attempt to remove Bible, and
its teachings has been the downfall of our society.
The original author
From our text we discover that whatever the Scripture says
was not the product of any human opinion, ingenuity, interpretation, or
explanation. It was, rather, the very Word of God. Furthermore, Scripture had
its origin in God, not with human beings. This verse, therefore, teaches us two
things with respect as to how the Bible was divinely inspired. First it was not
the will of the human authors that guided what was written in Scripture. A
second fact is that the ultimate source of writing was God the Holy Spirit.
This indicates that the Holy Spirit carried the human authors when they wrote
the Scripture. It was God who moved them. The Holy Spirit was the active agent.
God planted it there and their words brought the word of God to people because
they were being moved by the Holy Spirit to speak the words they shared.
Ultimately they were writing what the Holy Spirit prompted them to write.
The word translated “prophet” occurs over three hundred
times in the Old Testament and over one hundred times in the New Testament. A
prophet, is someone who speaks for someone else, the other being God. A prophet
speaks to man for or from God. Prophecy is not only a forth-telling of the
future – but contains promises of the future to both Israel and the nations of
the world. Prophecy covers the full panorama of history of mankind. God gave
promises to His prophets on Israel, the church, the consummation of the ages
with Christ ruling, to the new heavens and earth. God chose to reveal His words
to primarily one group of people - the Jews, whom He made from Abraham.
The prophets spoke in three time frames. There own
time, the near future and the far future, which would include the 1st coming
and the 2nd coming of Christ. The test of a prophet was his near prophesies
which would be fulfilled in his own lifetime. Prophecy was very specific in
detail in both the Old and the New Testament.
Prophecy teaches us God exists, and is in control of
history. God tells us the purpose of prophecy given to us in Scripture. “Remember
the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and
there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient
times things which have not been done, saying, ‘My purpose will be established,
and I will accomplish all My good pleasure’; “I declared the former things long
ago and they went forth from My mouth, and I proclaimed them. Suddenly I acted,
and they came to pass” (Isaiah 46:9,10). He is the God of prophecy.
The origin of the written Word of God is in the mind and
will of God. The authority of Scripture to write Scripture was given under the
direct control of God. Paul wrote. “But we speak the wisdom of God in a
mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory “(1
Corinthians 2:7). The wisdom of God in the gospel was a mystery hidden until
Christ came, and since then fully comprehended only by the initiated, the
full-grown Christians. The apostolic sense of mystery is that which was hidden,
but is now disclosed to those who accept the gospel. Those who will not receive
the gospel cannot comprehend this wisdom. Paul says in our text that Knowing
this first - Considering this as a first principle, - Bearing this steadily in
mind as a primary and most important truth that no prophecy of the scripture is
of any private interpretation. As the Scripture is the revelation of the
mind and will of God, every man ought to search it, to understand the sense and
meaning.
From Genesis to Revelation, the Scriptures reveal God’s
redemptive plan in Jesus Christ. The writings of Moses reveal God’s holy
nature, God’s laws and God’s redemptive plan of atonement for human sin. The
historical writings reveal the progressive revelation of God’s redemptive plan
in calling Abraham and through him, a family, then a nation to be his holy
people, to be a light of revelation to the other nations. Alongside the Law and
the Historical writings, the Psalms are the hymnbook of God’s people. But to
authenticate these writings as truly the Word of God, from eternity, God
foretold and revealed events in space time history before they occurred.
Prophecy can be found in the Bible from the beginning to the end. The Bible
devotes a large portion of its pages to the future; it is literally filled
with prophecy.
1 Corinthians 2:14 " The person without the
Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but
considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are
discerned only through the Spirit. ."The BIBLE is a unique book ever
written because it came from the infinite to the finite… from the unlimited,
all-powerful GOD, to limited man. Since the BIBLE is from GOD, and
therefore be spiritual, before you can receive its teachings, you must be born
of the SPIRIT (John 3:6) and filled with the SPIRIT (Ephesians 5:18). Always
approach the BIBLE praying that the HOLY SPIRIT will be your Teacher and will
guide you to a better understanding of HIS HOLY WORD. (John 16:12-15).
Keep in mind that the BIBLE is not a book of philosophy, although
it is philosophical. Do not go to the BIBLE for a scientific treatise. However,
there is no discrepancy between ascertained facts of science and the BIBLE. The
BIBLE is not a book of history, but is found to be accurate when recording
history. The BIBLE was given to man from GOD revealing JESUS CHRIST as the SON
of GOD, and GOD the SON, the only Savior (John 14:6). HE is the center and the
circumference. It is CHRIST from Genesis to Revelation (John 5:39).
2 Timothy 3:16,17 "All Scripture is inspired by GOD and
profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in
righteousness; that the man of GOD may be adequate, equipped for every good
work.""All Scripture is inspired by GOD…." simply means
that the HOLY SPIRIT exerted HIS supernatural influence upon the writers of the
BIBLE. Therefore, the Scriptures are inspired word for word. By this we mean
that every word, in the original, is fully and equally inspired in all of its
teachings. The BIBLE does not just contain the WORD OF GOD; it is the WORD OF
GOD. The writers of the BIBLE did not write by natural inspiration, or by an
act of the human will. "Men moved by the HOLY SPIRIT spoke from GOD."
(2 Peter 1:21). David said, "The SPIRIT of the LORD spoke by me, and HIS
word was on my tongue" (2 Samuel 23:2).The HOLY SPIRIT is the Author of
the BIBLE. (2 Peter 1:21) Man is the instrument used by the HOLY SPIRIT to
write the BIBLE.
THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE BOOK
The Bible authors come from a cross section of humanity;
educated and uneducated; including kings, fishermen, public officials, farmers,
teachers, and physicians. Some were kings, like David and Solomon and others
were very common people. Some of the prophets were just ordinary men. The Old
Testament prophet, Amos, said he was just a gatherer of sycamore fruit – that’s
all he did for a living. Others are better known men like Moses, who was highly
educated in the schools of Egypt, and Paul who also was a highly educated man.
Some were common fishermen, like Peter and John. Not much training, but taught
by the Lord himself, and by the Holy Spirit. So they come from a variety of
walks of life and addressed the various subjects like religion, history, law,
science, poetry, drama, biography, and prophecy. Yet its various parts are as
harmoniously united as the parts that make up the human body. The books are
gathered together into two divisions, the Old and New Testaments. The canon of
Old Testament scripture was completed in about the fourth century BC and there
are thirty-nine books in the Old Testament and twenty-seven books in the New
Testament, that were written between A.D. 55- 90.The Gospels recount
the story of Jesus Christ, the promised Messiah. Each book gives us a unique
perspective on his life.
For 40 Authors, with such varied backgrounds, to write on so
many subjects over a period of approximately 1,600 years in absolute harmony is
a mathematical impossibility. It could not happen! Then how do we enlighten the
distinctive of this Book? The only adequate explanation is… "….. Men
moved by the HOLY SPIRIT spoke from GOD" (2 Peter 1:21).
The Unity of the Book
The Bible exhibits a unity that—on purely human terms—is
utterly inexplicable. In order to appreciate that unity, one first must come to
terms with how The Book was put together. The Bible was written by more than
forty different men from practically every walk of life. Nehemiah was a royal
cupbearer. Peter was a fisherman. Luke was a physician. Matthew was a tax
collector. Solomon was a king. Moses was a shepherd. Paul was a tentmaker.
Furthermore, these men wrote from almost every conceivable human condition.
David wrote from heights of joy on the rolling, grassy hills of Judea. Paul
wrote from pits of despair caused by Roman incarceration. They wrote in three
languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek), from at least two continents (Europe
and Asia), over a period of time that spanned sixteen centuries (approximately
1500 B.C. to approximately A.D. 100). And they covered
topics as diverse as eschatology, soteriology, theology, psychology, geography,
history, medicine, and many others.
All this being true, one might expect that so diverse a
group of men, writing on so varied a group of subjects, over such a lengthy
span of time, would have produced a book that would be a tangled mishmash of
subjects more often than not marred by inconsistencies, errors, and
incongruities. Yet this hardly is the case. In fact, quite the opposite is
true. The Bible exhibits such astounding harmony, such consistent flow, and
such unparalleled unity that it defies any purely naturalistic explanation. It
is as if the Bible were a magnificent symphony orchestrated by a single
Conductor. The “musicians” each may have played a different instrument, in a
different place, at a different time. But when the talented Maestro combined
the individual efforts, the end-result was a striking masterpiece.
Consider this analogy. Suppose you assembled forty
contemporary scholars with the highest academic training possible in a single
field of study (e.g., forty academicians with terminal Ph.D. degrees in world
history). Suppose, further, that you placed them in a room, and asked them to
write a twenty-page paper on a single topic—the causes of World War II. What
kind of consensus would be exhibited when all of their treatises were
completed? Likely, the forty scholars would be unable to agree on all but a few
points; their compositions would be recognized more for the disagreements
they contained than for the agreements. The Bible writers, by contrast,
generally were not contemporaries. They worked independently, and the majority
never even met another biblical writer. Most were not highly trained, and what
training they did have certainly was not in the same field of study. Nor were
they allowed to write on a single topic in which they already had an interest.
Yet they produced a book that is unified from beginning to end. The books of 1
and 2 Chronicles and 1 and 2 Kings corroborate one another in numerous
historical events. Joshua 1 verifies Deuteronomy 34. Judges 1:1 verifies Joshua
24:27-33. Jeremiah 52:31-34 verifies 2 Kings 25:25,27-30. Ezra 1 verifies 2
Chronicles 36:22-23. Daniel refers to Jeremiah (Daniel 9:2), and Ezekiel refers
to Daniel (Ezekiel 28:3). And so on. This kind of unity, which is in evidence
throughout the Sacred Volume, attests to the fact that there was a
Superintending Intelligence behind it. So many writers, over so many years,
covering so many themes, simply could not have been so harmonious by mere
coincidence.
Each book of the Bible complements the others in a single,
unified plan. In Genesis, there is the record of humanity’s pristine
origin and covenant relationship with God, followed by its tragic fall into a
sinful state. But, a specific family line (the Hebrew nation) was selected to
provide a remedy for this disaster (Genesis 12:1ff.; 22:18). Man needed to
learn precisely what sin is, thus the books of Exodus through Deuteronomy
document the giving of the law of God to Moses. Via a set of ordinances, sin
would be defined and humanity would be illuminated regarding the price of
rebellion against God (Romans 7:7,13; Galatians 3:19). The historical books of
the Old Testament revealed mankind’s inability to keep perfectly God’s law
system (Galatians 3:10), and therefore underscored the need for a Justifier—Someone
to do for man what he could not do for himself. The prophets of the Old
Testament heralded the arrival of that Savior (Luke 24:44); more than 300
prophecies focus on the promised Messiah.
After four silent centuries (the “inter-biblical era”), four
Gospel writers described in great detail the arrival, and life’s-work, of the
Justifier—Jesus of Nazareth. The books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are
carefully crafted accounts of the birth, life, death, and ultimate resurrection
of the Son of God (John 20:30-31). Each emphasized different parts of Christ’s
ministry in order to relate the “good news” to Jews or Gentiles. Matthew
directed his record primarily to the Jewish nation. Mark stressed the works of
Jesus. Luke, being the only Gentile writer of a Bible book (except possibly the
author of Job), wrote to Gentiles. John’s primary purpose in writing was to
produce faith.
The book of Acts was written to convey the means by which
mankind was to appropriate God’s saving grace. It is a historical record that
instructs a person on how to become a Christian. It also teaches about how the
church of Christ was established in Jerusalem, and how that same church
flourished throughout the Roman Empire of the first century. The various
epistles that follow the book of Acts in the English Bible were directions to
individuals and churches on how to obtain, and maintain, spiritual maturity.
Finally, the book of Revelation predicted (in symbolic fashion) the ultimate
triumph of good over evil—acknowledging that Christians would win, and Satan
would lose. To the careful reader, the unity of both theme and plan in the
Bible are apparent.
The Harmony of the Book
The Bible is not just one single book – it’s a diverse collection of 66 thoroughly harmonious books with one single theme that contains a broad variety of
genres: historical, narrative, epic, law, poetry, prophecy, wisdom, gospel,
apocalyptic and letters.
The harmony, of the BIBLE is a miracle each book of the Bible complements the
others in a single unified theme. From Genesis to Revelation there is a
marvelous unfolding of the general theme of man’s fall from his holy estate,
God’s plan for his redemption (as carefully worked out across the centuries),
the sinless life and atoning death of Jesus Christ, and the ultimate victory of
the Christian system. In essence, the Bible is the story of one
problem—sin—with one solution, Jesus Christ. In commenting on the Bible’s
remarkable unity of theme, Wayne Jackson has noted: The redemptive thread that
runs through the Scriptures is wonderfully illustrated by a comparison between
Genesis and Revelation, the first and last books of the holy canon. In Genesis
the origin of the heavens and Earth is revealed (1:1), while in Revelation the
consummation of earthly affairs is effected, and the old order is replaced by a
“new heaven and earth” (i.e., heaven itself), spiritual in nature.... Man, who
was originally perfect, but who fell into sin (Genesis 3:6), is, by virtue of
his obedience, granted the opportunity to become perfect again (Revelation
7:14; 22:14). All of this is made possible, of course, by the seed of woman
(Genesis 3:15), the offspring of David (Revelation 22:16), who, as a
consequence of his sacrifice (Genesis 4:4), became an enthroned Lamb
(Revelation 21:4). Thus, the sorrow of Eden (Genesis 3:16) will be transformed
into the joy of heaven (Revelation 21:4), and that tree of life, from which our
early parents were separated (Genesis 3:22-24), will be our glad possession
once more (Revelation 22:14) [1991, 11:1].
If the Bible is true, then in its pages we can find ultimate
meaning for our lives and the God we have searched for. We can read of His
mighty and gracious acts among people and nations in the Old Testament, and we
can especially see His love and compassion in the New Testament. For it is
undeniably true that if we want to know who God really is, and what He is
really like, we only need to look at Jesus Christ (John 14:6-11; 12:44,45). To
know that the Bible is reliable is to know that all of what it teaches is
reliable. And what it teaches is that the one true God sent His only Son to die
for our sins so that we could inherit eternal life as a free gift (John 3:16;
Rom. 3:22-26). Such a claim is phenomenal in its uniqueness and profundity. If
the Bible is truly God’s Word to us, and if we reject its message of salvation,
then no other personal decision they make will be more consequential. Therefore
no one can fail to ignore the issue of the reliability of the Bible—not merely
its historical reliability but its spiritual reliability as well.
To be continued…………
