Is the Bible truly the inspired Word of God and what does inspiration mean?

Ishmael LaBiosa: Welcome to the You Ask Podcast, where the goal is to answer common questions about Christianity. Let's listen in as Pastor Rusty answers today's question. Today's question is: Is the Bible truly the inspired word of God? And what does inspiration mean? Very important question. You know, I hear a lot of people say that. You know, it's you Bible-believing Christians that think the Bible is the Word of God, but we just think that the Bible is just some ancient book, and it's only Bible-believing Christians that have ascribed this divine status to it. And so the question that has been asked, is the Bible truly the inspired word of God? And my simple answer to that is Is is this. If we're going to try to understand what the Bible is, as if we were to attempt to understand what any book is, we might ought to just see what the book says it is. So I know when I walk in a library that there are different sections in the library. There's a fiction, and then there are You know, sections on religion and sections in medicine. And so the books are classified in a library because there's some quality within the book that has given indication that a particular book is to be filed away in a particular section. So it'd be interesting to first of all ask the question, you know, is the Bible from God? What does the Bible say? And there's a few ways that you could do this. ⁓ one, you could sit down and read the whole Bible. You could study the Bible verse by verse and see what understanding of the nature of scripture emerges. That's perfectly reasonable and good. Or you could do something else, which we're going to do today because we don't have time in a short podcast to read the whole Bible. Is that we could study some pertinent passages about the Bible. To understand how the biblical authors understood the nature of scripture. So rather than myself making a judgment call about whether the Bible's the word of God, why don't I ask the question, does the Bible think it's the word of God? And I would just point to some key text here. 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17 says, all scripture is inspired by God. And is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Now we'll have to see here that the word inspired is used, and kind of the second part of our question today is what does inspiration mean? But first of all, I want you to see here that it is Second Timothy three, it's the Bible itself that says. All scripture is inspired by God. Actually, we'll go ahead and tip your hand to a truth that we'll learn here in a moment, because you also asked the question what does inspiration mean? And actually, the simple idea of inspiration means that the source of the Bible, that's what inspiration means, is God. Actually, the word here, inspiration, actually means God. Breathe. That's what the word inspired means. It means God is the source of Scripture. You also have texts like Second Peter chapter one, verse nineteen, it says, We have the prophetic word strongly confirmed. You will do well to pay attention to it as a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts. And then listen to these words about Scripture. First of all, you should know this. No prophecy of Scripture. comes from one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the will of man. Instead, moved by the Holy Spirit, men spoke from God. It's a pretty straightforward statement. And now some people have looked at passages like Second Timothy chapter three, verse sixteen, and second Peter chapter one And it said, Well, yes, Rusty, that does seem to say these New Testament passages are saying that Scriptures inspire, but these texts are primarily talking about the Old Testament, not the New Testament. And that that might be true to some level, but notice we have passages like Second Peter, for example, Second Peter chapter three, verse 15 and 16. And we ought to listen to this. It says, also regard the patience of our Lord. As an opportunity for salvation. Now listen to this text as I read it. Just as our dear brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, he speaks about these things in all his letters, which there are some matters that are hard to understand. It says, the untaught and unstable twists them to their own destruction. Now listen, you ought to underline this in your Bible, 2 Peter 3:16, as they do. With the rest of the scriptures. So, what am I trying to point out here? That it is Peter who places the writings of Paul on the same level as the scriptures, the Old Testament scriptures, which begins to point out the fact that it's the biblical witness that Old and New Testament comes from God as its source. And then you have passages like in the mouth of Jesus, Matthew 5. He says, For I assure you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or one stroke of the letter will pass from the law until all things are accomplished. I just want to pause here and point out that let's go back to our earlier statement because the question on the table is: Is the Bible truly the inspired word of God? And the simple answer here is. It is the Bible itself that claims it is the Word of God. Now, if you say, Well, I don't think the Bible is the Word of God, I think it's just an ancient book. Well, you can say whatever you want to say, but understand it is the witness of the Bible that doesn't declare it merely to be an ancient book. It is the witness of the Bible that declares it to be from God. And so it is in some ways the burden of proof on the person who claims the Bible is merely an ancient book, is a counterclaim to what the Bible actually says, because the Bible actually says it's from God. Now, some people are quick to quip and say, well, there's other holy books that people claim that other holy books are from God. Well, that's certainly true. But this is where it is Jesus. Who also seems to fully claim that the Bible is the Word of God. And his claim that the Bible is the Word of God certainly doesn't just make this a claim of an ancient book, it makes it the claim of Jesus who died and rose again. That's another issue all the way around. But the authority of the Bible is. intricately connected to the person of Jesus who declares it to be from God. I will also say, people say, well can't we f why do we need revelation? And my two cents is I do not believe that you can even g have morality apart from God. And the only way that we know what God thinks is if God speaks. And the Bible claims that God has indeed spoken, and He has spoken through His Word. So is the Bible truly the inspired word of God? The Bible and Jesus say yes. The question is what say you? Let me make one other point here about inspiration. In the field of Christian theology, we have something called theories of inspiration, because the idea is God is the source of scripture. All scripture is inspired by God. It's God breathed. But we also realize that the Bible is a human and divine book. It is God who communicates to human authors, and they write. And so what is the nature of inspiration? And I just want to kind of tell you what a think it is and what I think it isn't, and kind of point to a middle ground. So what I think it is, there's this theory, it's a way of speaking, we hope, accurately about the Bible, that Christians often say, evangelical Christians say they believe in the verbal plenary inspiration of the Bible, which means that God is aware of the personality of the human author. And It doesn't take too long to read the Bible, 66 books, and we get to see a multiplicity of authors, and they have different styles. That's true. But the Holy Spirit's guidance, while not overwhelming the human author's personality, goes to the very words that that author conveys, and yet he does so through the personality of the human author. I think that's pretty straightforward. Evangelicals have almost to a person. Even very conservative evangelicals have denied what is often called the dictation theory, that we don't think that God just totally superimposes over a human author to blank out their personality, because we clearly see that. But neither do we say on the other side of the qu equation that the Bible is kind of like has human elements and it has divine elements and they're kind of mixed up in there. Nor do we say that just the human author Has just like a heightening of normal insight or something. No, the scriptures are from God, but God chooses humans to write the scriptures. And what the humans who write the scriptures say, the truths of what God wants to say extends to the very words that they write, but God allows the personality of the human author to shine through, even though his message is communicated. And that's what we mean when we say the Bible has its source in God, but is written by human authors that we believe in the verbal, meaning to the words theory of inspiration. So I hope this helps you. Is the Bible the word of God? That's what the Bible says. That's what Jesus says. And what does inspiration mean? Well, it means the Bible has its source in God. And that the very words of the Bible are from God, but God uses the personality of the human authors as he communicates his truth to the world. Thank you for listening to the You Ask Podcast. This is a ministry of Liberty Baptist Church. And we pray this podcast enables you to more faithfully live out your Christian life.

2 Peter 3:16