He is a prolific writer and has authored or edited numerous books, including The Doctrine of God; Biblical Interpretation; God Is Love; and God Has Spoken. We do not need to worry too much about the mistakes scribes made in copying, since many of these can be corrected and few have any real significance as far as the meaning of the original is concerned. Solomon, in turn, was followed by a number of idolatrous rulers, and the path of Israel ran farther and farther away from the Lord, until He delivered them over unto Nebuchadnezzar who captured their beloved Jerusalem, destroyed their Temple, and carried away the people into captivity. To sum up this argument. Deny that the Bible is, without any qualifications, the very Word of God, and you are left without any ultimate standard of measurement and without any supreme authority. What am I? If the claims of the Bible be well founded then the prayerful and diligent study of the Scriptures becomes of paramount importance: they have a claim upon our notice and time which nothing else has, and beside them everything in this world loses its luster and sinks into utter insignificance. As is well known, human historians are inclined to conceal or extenuate the faults of their favorites. What other book, ancient or modern, Oriental or Occidental, would repay even a fiftieth reading? Why am I here in this world at all? One can readily appreciate the fact that the answer to these questions is of supreme importance. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger. Trying circumstances had banished the Living God from their thoughts. The height of every Jewish woman’s ambition was that she might be selected of God to have the honor of being the mother of the promised Seed. The New Testament is less open to this kind of objection because the time period it covers is much shorter and better known, but there are still many details about the life of Jesus and the career of the apostle Paul which are hard to piece together from the texts. Surely he would have been set forth as the most distinguished among our Lord’s followers; surely, human wisdom would have set him at the right hand of the Saviour! They are not anxious to believe a delusion. The more widely it is known, the more closely it is read, the more carefully it is studied, the more unreservedly will it be received as the Word of God. The words, phrases, and clauses work together to give us His message, and each portion of … Just as a knowledge of Latin is necessary in order to understand the technique of a treatise on pathology or physiology, or just as a certain amount of culture and academic learning is an indispensable adjunct to intelligently follow the arguments and apprehend the illustrations in a dissertation on philosophy or psychology, so a first-hand acquaintance with the Bible is necessary to appreciate the fact that its contents never become commonplace. Unlike all other books, the Bible never acquires a sameness, and never diminishes in its power of response to the needy soul which comes to it. It is further to be observed that those who were thus commissioned to carry the Gospel to the lost, were vested with power to heal the sick and to cast out demons. They do not wish to mistake hallucination for inspiration. This question gets at something theologians call Inspiration. 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. Upon the foundation of the Divine inspiration of the Bible stands or falls the entire edifice of Christian truth. If it is harder to believe that the universe had no creator, than it is to believe that “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth;” if it is a greater tax upon our faith to suppose that Christianity with all its glorious triumphs is without a Divine Founder, than it is to believe that it rests upon the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ; then, does it not also make a greater demand upon human credulity to imagine that God would leave mankind without an intelligible communication from Himself, than it does to believe that the Bible is a revelation from the Creator to His fallen and erring creatures? Consequently, the fact that we are not told more about the exact way in which the Holy Spirit divinely inspired the authors of Scripture to write precisely what God wanted them to write should not be that surprising. Matthew Maury (1806-1873) is considered the father of oceanography. Still God dealt with them in grace. A forged history would have clothed friends with every virtue, and would not have ventured to mar the effect designed to be produced by uncovering the vices of its most distinguished personages. In view of the fact that the contents of the Scriptures cannot be exhausted, that they never acquire sameness or staleness to the devout student, and that they always speak with fresh force to the quickened soul that comes to them, is it not apparent that none other than the infinite mind of God could have created such a wonderful Book as the Bible? If they are mistaken, they desire to be corrected. they be almost ready to stone me.” What was God’s response? What the mind of man has produced the mind of man can exhaust. That to which we desire to direct attention is the fact that men who were their own countrymen have chronicled the history of the Israelites, and therein have faithfully recorded their defeats not to an inexorable fate, nor to bad generalship and military failures, but to the sins of the people and their wickedness against God. Shortly after God’s intervention in giving the Israelites food to eat, which ought for ever to have closed their murmuring mouths, they pitched in Rephidim where “there was no water for the people to drink. It is impossible to over-estimate the importance of the doctrine of the Divine inspiration of Scripture. Aaron and the golden calf, Solomon and the later kings being notable examples - “Then did Solomon build a high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the children of Ammon. Surrender the dogma of verbal inspiration and you are left like a rudderless ship on a stormy sea-at the mercy of every wind that blows. After they had been emancipated from the bondage of Egypt and had been miraculously delivered from their cruel masters at the Red Sea, they commenced their journey towards the Promised Land. Arguments of this kind make logical sense, but they come up against the obvious objections that we do not possess the original manuscripts and that all the copies we have contain errors of various kinds. 16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 2 Timothy 3:16 Meaning. Instead of fearing it, the Bible courts and challenges consideration and examination. In the spring of the year, when nature puts on her loveliest robes and we see the beautiful foliage of the countryside and listen to the happy songs of the birds, we have no difficulty in inferring that a gracious God is ruling over our world. What explanation can we offer for this startling phenomenon? (1886-1952) He studied at Moody Bible Institute, and was an evangelist, expository teacher, and author. This, too, gives invariable evidence of the Bible’s Divine inspiration. Were the writers of the Bible so many fanatics moved by oracular frenzy? When we stood by the seashore and watched the setting sun crimsoning the placid waters on a quiet eve, we had no hesitation in ascribing the picture to the hand of the Divine Artist. Historians have found no evidence for the existence of Esther or Daniel, and many scholars believe that they were made up in later times for what were essentially political reasons. Although the Bible has been studied more microscopically than any other book (even its very letters have been counted and registered) by many of the keenest intellects for the past two thousand years, although whole libraries of works have been written as commentaries upon its teachings, and although literally millions of sermons have been preached and printed in the attempt to expound every part of Holy Writ, yet its contents have not been exhausted, and in this twentieth century new discoveries are being made in it every day! We need some final court of appeal: if we had no Bible, where should we find it? What is to govern and regulate our dealings one with the other? The Bible has a whole continent of Truth yet to be explored. Divine Inspiration and the Word of God Permission given to copy this page for use in class. Do I perish like the beasts of the field, or is the grave the portal into another world? There are trials and tribulations which come to us, testing the hearts of the bravest and stoutest, and we need comfort and cheer. One one end of the scale is the 100% Inspiration view. ‘We do not idolize him. A very striking testimony to man’s need of a Divine revelation was given by the celebrated but skeptical historian Gibbon. As a Divine revelation the Bible ought to be studied, yet, this is the only subject on which human curiosity does not desire information. Upon the foundation of the Divine inspiration of the Bible stands or falls the entire edifice of Christian truth. Shall each do that which is right in his own eyes? Infallibility and inerrancy are best viewed as logical deductions from the principle of divine inspiration. They do not desire their lives to be molded by an empty superstition. “He was despised and rejected of men.” “He came unto His own and His own received Him not.” Those who were His brethren according to the flesh “hated” Him “without a cause.” The very nation which gave Him birth and to which He ministered in infinite grace and blessing demanded that He should be crucified. As we have seen, nature is but an imperfect medium for revealing God. John the Baptist was himself the subject of Old Testament prediction. Were they merely poetically inspired and intellectually elevated? Moreover, there is no attempt made to excuse their wrongdoing; instead, their acts are openly censured and uncompromisingly condemned. 11), a reply which shows very plainly that the question was asked not for the benefit of his disciples, but because the Baptist’s own heart was harassed with doubts. 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