Throughout history, people have ridiculed the idea of biblical inerrancy and do not believe it to be free from error or untruths or culturally appropriate today. To the faithless, the Bible is simply another fallible book written by imperfect humans.
Within the pages of the Bible, it is written, "God said...,” "thus says the Lord," or these are "the words of the Lord...." These kinds of statements appear hundreds of times in both the Old and New Testaments (ex: Ex 20:1; 4:1; 5:14; Ps 119). The writers of the Bible were moved and guided into all truth by God, the Holy Spirit (John 16:13; 2 Peter 1:21).
Not only does the Bible claim to be inspired, but it also defines and describes what it means by inspiration. The Apostle Paul, writing under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, claimed, "All scripture is given by inspiration of God" (2 Tim 3:16). The Greek term underlying the word "inspiration" is 'theopneustos' and means "God-breathed," just as His breath brought the Universe into existence and gave life to human beings (Ps 33:6; Gen 2:7). Paul said, "Therefore...preach the word" because it is God's breathed-out word to humanity (2 Tim 4:2). It must be noted there is a growing belief, in what appears to be an attempt to undermine the divine authority of Scripture, that Paul was not the author of the Pastoral Epistles and that they were written after the first century. Although there is considerable proof to refute those claims, it doesn't matter who wrote them or when.
Time and time again, Jesus and the writers of the Bible attributed their actual words to God and sometimes referred to the Scriptures as if they were God (Rom 9:17; Gal 3:8). They also referred to God as if He were Scripture. King David said, "The Spirit of the Lord speaks by me; His word is on my tongue" (2 Sam 23:2). The Bible presents itself as the very words of God, and the writers made it very clear He is its author (Matt 19:4-6; see Gen 2:24; 2 Tim 3:16; 1 Cor 6:16).
Throughout the Bible, it says that God spoke the words of Scripture even though the words attributed to God were not specifically His words in their original setting, but merely the words of Scripture itself (Ps 2:1, 16:10, 95:7; Isa 55:3; Acts 4:25,13:34; Heb 3:7).
What did Jesus say about the Scriptures?
The New Testament declares that Jesus was "pure" and "righteous" (1 John 3:3; 2:1), and "committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth" (1 Peter 2:22). He was "a lamb without blemish and without spot" (1 Peter 1:19), "Who knew no sin" (2 Cor 5:21). Jesus was not a mere human being. He was 100% a perfect human being and 100% fully God.
Jesus prayed on the night of His betrayal, God's "word is truth" (John 17: 17). He, nor the direct writers of the Bible, ever doubted or called into question a single passage of Scripture, but believed in the truthfulness and historical reliability of even the most disputed parts of the Old Testament.
Jesus confirmed the existence of an original couple created during the Creation week (Matt 19:4; Gen 2:24), and that Noah was a real person and that there was a global flood (Matt 24:37-39; 2 Peter 2:5; 3:6; Gen 6-8); Lot was a real person, and the city of Sodom was thoroughly destroyed (Luke 17:28-32; 2 Peter 2:6-7; Gen 19); Jonah spent three days and nights in the belly of a great fish (Matt 12:39-40); and the Israelites were miraculously healed when they looked at the bronze snake set up by Moses in the desert (John 3:14; Num 21:4-9).
Jesus endorsed the entirety of the Old Testament at least a dozen times, using such designations as the Scriptures (John 5:39); the Law (John 10:34); the Law and the Prophets (Matt 5:17); the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms (Luke 24:44); or Moses and the Prophets (Luke 16:29).
Jesus also quoted, cited from, or alluded to incidents in at least eighteen different Old Testament books. He affirmed verbal inspiration down to the very minutest accuracy each letter of Scripture when He said;
"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished." (Matt 5:17-18 ESV)
The word "iota" (yod) was the smallest Hebrew letter, and the "dot" was the tiny stroke on specific Hebrew letters. It is equivalent to saying that even the dotting of "i" s and crossing of "t" s will stand.
The Pharisees challenged Jesus to clarify the identity of the Messiah (Matt 22:41-45). Jesus focused on David's use of the single term "Lord" in Psalm 110:1 and asked them, "If David then calls Him 'Lord,' how is He his Son?" (Matt 22:45). The point Jesus made depended on verbal inspiration.
After His resurrection, Jesus appeared to two men, who did not recognize Him on the road to Emmaus, and were downhearted and confused by the crucifixion of the One who "was going to redeem Israel" (Luke 24:16, 21). Jesus asked what they were upset about, and after they told Him, He chastised them and said, "O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?" (Luke 24:25-26). They were guilty of neglecting to believe in all that they said about the promised Messiah, and Jesus began giving them a Bible lesson they would never forget! He reminded them of the "beginning with Moses and all the Prophets," and "interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself" (Luke 24:27).
Jesus often rebuked the religious antagonists by asking them, "Have you not read even this Scripture?" (Mark 12:10; Matt 21:42); "You do err, not knowing the Scriptures" (Matt 22:29); "if you had known what this means" (Matt 12:7); or "Go and learn what this means" (Mark 9:13). The point He was making to them was that God's truth is found in Scripture, and if a person is ignorant or unknowledgeable of the Scriptures, then they are susceptible to error.
Jesus also ascribed legal authority to the Law and equated it with all of Scripture and said that Scripture couldn't be annulled, denied, or its truth to be broken (John 10:34-25, 15:25; see Ps 82:6). Those He spoke to understood that as well.
What did the Apostles say about the Scriptures?
The Apostle Paul said that his teachings came to him "through revelation of Jesus Christ" (Gal 1:12); his words were "by the word of the Lord" (1 Thess 4:15); it was God's message "revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets" (Eph 3:5); and "the things which" he wrote were "the commandments of the Lord" (1 Cor 14:37).
Paul declared that the things, and messages, of God, were revealed to human beings by the Holy Spirit, when he said, "we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual" (1 Cor 2:13 ESV; also John 17:8).
Paul also quoted from the Psalms, Isaiah, and Genesis, referring to each of them as "the Law" (1 Cor 14:21; Rom 3:19; Gal 4:21). He affirmed that Adam was the first human (1 Cor 15:45); that Eve was created after Adam (2:13; Gen 2:7,21-25); and was literally deceived by the serpent (aka satan) (2 Cor 11:3; 1 Tim 2:13-14; Gen 3). He also believed that the Israelites crossed the Red Sea and that they drank water from a rock (1 Cor 10:1-4; Heb 11:29; Ex 14). Paul quoted books of the Old Testament and classified them as "Scripture" (Deut 25:4; Luke 10:7; 1 Tim 5:18).
When Paul wrote to the Corinthians about sex in marriage, he said, "Now as a concession (Gk: 'suggnómé' which means confession' fellow feeling, and is also translated as 'permission'), not a command" (Gk: 'epitagé' which means instruction, command, order, authority), he then proceeds to speak his thoughts that were approved by God, but were not previously given directly to him by God. In other words, Paul knew that what he wrote to the churches, unless he noted otherwise, were the things that God directly told him to write.
Paul did not invent facts about Old Testament stories. Neither did he have to rely on his own fallible memory to recall particular numbers or names. His writings were God-breathed (2 Peter 3:16). The Holy Spirit revealed ALL the Truth found in the Bible to him (John 14:26; John 16:13). Just like the writers of the Old Testament, Paul was entirely inspired by the Holy Spirit (2 Sam 23:2; Acts 1:16; 2 Peter 1:20-21; 3:15-16; 2 Tim 3:16-17).
The Apostle Peter said that God spoke from heaven directly to Peter, James, and John at the Transfiguration of Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:16-21). When Peter wrote about what happened at the Transfiguration, he said, "And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, ... knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation" or comes "the will of man" or from the minds of those who wrote them (2 Peter 1:16-20).
Peter was clearly saying that the Scriptures (aka the prophetic words) are just as sure and just as authoritative as the voice of God that spoke on the Mount of Transfiguration because "holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit" (2 Peter 1:21). The word "moved" in Greek is ‘pheromenoi’ and means "borne" or "brought." Peter stated that it was the Holy Spirit who picked up the writers (the Prophets) and "brought" them to write what was He wanted them to.
Peter is the one, while waiting for the coming of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, who stood up among his fellow disciples and declared, "Men and brethren, this Scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke before by the mouth of David concerning Judas." Then he quoted from the Psalms (Acts 1:16). Peter believed that it was the Holy Spirit who guided what David wrote, and the result of that writing is designated as "Scripture."
Peter explained that the writers of the Old Testament did not always understand all the information that God gave them and that it was the Spirit of the Messiah that inspired them to write what they did, and that is it He who inspired and directed the Apostles to say and write what they did (see 1 Peter 1:10-12).
Peter, referred to the writings of the Apostle Paul as Scripture when he said, "our beloved brother Paul" who had written to them "in all his epistles" spoke to them things "that were hard to be understood, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures" (2 Peter 3:15-16). Peter was saying that it was Paul who wrote the Pastoral Epistles and that they were just as inspired and authoritative as the Old Testament and other New Testament writings.
The Apostle Peter also believed that Noah was a real person, and the global Flood was a historical event (Matt 24:37-39; 2 Peter 2:5; 3:6; Gen 6-8). He also believed the historicity of Lot and the destruction of Sodom (2 Peter 2:6-7; Gen 19).
The writers of both the Old and New Testaments placed great emphasis on the fact that their message was of divine origin and that they spoke "by the Holy Spirit" (2 Peter 1:21). Numerous examples demonstrate the trustworthiness of Scripture. The Old Testament writers who came after Moses expressed total trust in the Pentateuch, as well as in each other's writings. The New Testament writers always acknowledged that God ensured the precise accuracy of the original versions and viewed statements by each other, and the Old Testament writers, as being truthful, regardless of the subject matter, and never criticized each other's writings (see Gal 2:11; 2 Peter 3:15-16).
In the book of Hebrews, the Scriptures of the Old Testament are quoted and attributed to God as the speaker even though sometimes He was not the direct speaker (Ps 2:7, 45:6-7, 102:25-27, 104.4, 110:1; Deut 32:43).
Jesus and the Bible writers always worked from the premise that God's Word is ENTIRELY true and inspired by Him, even down to the very tense of a verb and number of a noun, and not PARTIALLY true, or only the "spiritual" parts were true.
"The sum [entirety] of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever." (Ps 119:160 ESV)
The fact remains that if any of these men made mistakes in their writings, then they were not inspired by God because God does not make mistakes (2 Tim 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Titus 1:2; Ps 139:1-6). If the Bible was not "given by inspiration of God," then all of it is not from God.
God Cannot Lie and does Not Change
From beginning to end, the Bible reveals that the infinite, eternal Being Who created everything and everyone that exists in the Universe (other than Himself) is truthful. His "Spirit is truth" (1 John 5:6), His "words are true" (2 Samuel 7:28), His "law is truth" (Psalm 119:14), His "commandments are truth" (Psalm 119:151), His "judgments...are true" (Psalm 19:9), and His "works are truth" (Daniel 4:37). He literally embodies truth. When God, the Son, was on Earth, He claimed to be truth (John 14:6). There is nothing false about God. When Paul wrote to Titus, he described God as the One "who cannot lie" (1:2). Similarly, the writer of Hebrews declared that "it is impossible for God to lie" (6:18).
God is perfect, and if the Bible is the Word of God, then in its original form as it initially came from Him, it is perfect. The Scriptures cannot err if they are born of God. The Bible is either from God and flawless in its original writing, or it contains mistakes, and therefore did not come from the God of truth. There is no middle ground. A person can't have it both ways.
The Bible is not merely a human book because it is God-breathed. Like Jesus, who was 100% God and 100% human but did not sin, both the living Word (Christ) and the written Word (Bible) are human and divine but do not err. There can no more be an error in God's written Word than there was a sin in God's living Word, Jesus.
The idea that the Bible was just partially inspired impugns the integrity and nature of God and must be rejected as heresy. If God is capable of communicating His truth to human beings, it is both unthinkable and logically implausible that He could not or would not do so with complete consistency and certainty.
The Authority of the Bible
The Gospel message found in the Bible defines that a true Disciple of Jesus has accepted what it says about who Jesus is; that they are a sinner in need of forgiveness, and that Jesus died for their sins and rose from the dead, justifying them at the moment of their salvation that is by grace and not by works. There is no way to know who Jesus is and what He believed and taught if there was no Bible. A person comes to an understanding of the Gospel message through revelation given by the Holy Spirit, but there would be no way to verify that revelation if the Bible could not be taken literally at face value (John 14:6).
If there wasn't a definite way to interpret Scripture, then a Disciple of Jesus is without hope regarding biblical understanding, and the fundamentals of the faith could not be truly known as they would become open for anyone's interpretation.
God made certain that the words produced by the human writers He inspired were free from the errors and mistakes characteristic of uninspired writers. The Bible encourages God's people hundreds of times to trust the Scriptures thoroughly, but no text encourages any doubt of, or even slight mistrust in, Scripture. To rely on the inerrancy of every historical detail affirmed in Scripture is to follow the teaching and practice of the biblical authors themselves.
If a Born-Again Christian abandons the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, then it would be impossible to have a standard of truth by which all humans are to live their lives. Scripture cannot be demonstrated to be divinely authoritative if the Bible contained factual errors.
If it is believed that the Bible is fallible, then one is forced to accept the inevitable conclusion that, on some occasions, God "breathed" truth, while on others, He "breathed" error (2 Tim 3:16).
God can inspire a human being to write theological and doctrinal truths, so it is logical to say that He can simultaneously inspire the same person to write with historical and scientific precision. Any attack upon the trustworthiness of any passage in the Bible is an attack upon Almighty God.
If ALL Scripture is not God-breathed, then it is NOT "profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness," and the Born-Again Christian will never be "complete, and equipped for every good work" (2 Tim 2:16-17). If the Bible is not reliable and trustworthy, then it cannot be relied upon to be truthful and accurate regarding any matter.
If God is omnipotent, then He is incapable of not preserving human writers from making false statements in their recording of His words. He is not a liar, nor would He allow an inspired person to speak falsely. Because the Bible is God's Word, it is correct in whatever matters it addresses. If God cannot correctly and truthfully handle any progressive cultural, or physical, issues, then His Word, the Bible, cannot be relied upon to be truthful and accurate regarding ANY matter.
It is illogical, and insulting to the omniscient Creator of all things, to believe that He could not have known that cultural norms would regularly change like shifting sand, and then not say that something in the Bible specifically, and only, applied to the culture of the early church, or make it perfectly clear when something He said was just temporary. Either God's written Word, the Bible, is absolutely infallible, without error, and the final authority in all things (i.e., Doctrine) that pertain to the life of a Born-Again Christian, or NONE of it is.
There is no foundation to build a dialogue with a person who says they are Born-Again but does not believe everything written in the Bible came directly from God. If they don't believe the Bible is inerrant about earthly things, how will they "believe if" Jesus tells them about "heavenly things" (John 3:12)?
Every heretical teaching in Christianity throughout history was a result of people listening to the voices in their head and not rightly dividing God's Word. Simple logic confirms that the word 'yes,' can only mean 'yes,' 1+1 can only equal 2, 'Up' can't mean 'down,’ 'cat' can't mean 'dog,’ 'right' can't mean 'wrong,' etc., no matter how much 'fresh' revelation a person thinks they received. A word or verse can only mean what was intended by the original author in its grammatical and historical context, no matter how much a person doesn't agree with it or it goes against the cultural morays of modern society.
The Plain Interpretation of Scripture
The Bible was divinely breathed out by God for timeless application and written over a period of 2,000 years by 40 or more authors using three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek). The authors wrote in different genres and had different vocabularies, personalities, cultural backgrounds, and social standings. The Holy Spirit moved each of these men to produce His inspired, inerrant, and infallible Word, but He allowed their various writing styles and personalities to be expressed in its pages (2 Tim 3:16; 2 Peter 1:20–21). It was written in a culture very different from our modern world and was translated from its original languages. These are just some of the factors that must be taken into account when interpreting what was said.
Hermeneutics (from the Greek word 'hermeneuo,' which means to explain or interpret) is the branch of theology that focuses on identifying and applying the science and art of understanding, translating, and explaining the meaning of the Scripture text. While the Bible is generally plain in its meaning, proper interpretation requires careful study and is not always an easy task. The spiritual sense must always be derived from the grammatical sense.
A critical difference between methods of interpretation is the difference between exegesis and eisegesis. Exegesis is a method of interpretation that strives to understand the original meaning OUT of the biblical text. Eisegesis is an interpretation of Scripture that reads the interpreter's own allegorical ideas, or bias, INTO the text. Exegesis says, "This is what the text means." Eisegesis says, "This is what I want the text to mean." A text out of context becomes a pretext for a proof text to twist God's Word into a pretzel.
Every translator of the Bible since day one, no matter what language, uses the rules of biblical hermeneutics to exegete a verse to get the correct and original intended meaning so that they can rightly divide it. The Bible needs to say the same thing in each language it is translated into, or it cannot be the authoritative means of communicating truth.
Any method of interpretation that allows eisegesis to be imposed on the text is clearly unverifiable. Those who propose a personal eisegetic meaning of the Bible are actually claiming that their mind is the source of the authority of the interpretation and not the Bible. Those who accept someone's interpretation is actually trusting the interpreter rather than the text itself.
The Bible does not say anywhere that a person should not take it as plainly written. Anyone who says that the Bible does not need to be taken as plainly written has not been Born-Again. The Bible was divinely given by God so that human beings could understand it. There is nothing in it that is contrary to human intelligence and logic.
When a Born-Again Christian relies on a source, such as scientific evidence, that contradicts the plain reading of the Bible, they have abandoned the plain reading of the Scripture and compromised everything the Bible says about such things as a virgin giving birth, walking on water, raising people from the dead, etc., etc., etc., therefore Jesus hasn't risen from the dead and Christianity is false.
The Born-Again Christian is commanded to defend the Bible as plainly written:
"… but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect." (1 Peter 3:15 ESV)
There has never been a charge of discrepancy sustained against the Bible, which is truth without any mixture of error. Truth, by definition, must be consistent with itself and contain no contradictions or errors. Infallibility without inerrancy cannot be sustained without logical contradiction. The timeless truths found in the Bible are not the result of some collective cultural discovery but are breathed-out directly by God.
God has never changed His mind, and He never will. His law has never changed and was fulfilled in Jesus, but it was not done away with. If God said, I do not permit or allow something 2000 years ago, He means it for today. He has provided sufficient evidence to allow an honest person to arrive at the truth and to know His will if they apply themselves in a diligent study of His written Word (John 6:45; 7:17; 8:32). Those who are willing to compromise, and who back away from a devotion to verbal inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, demonstrate a lack of saving faith in both God and His written Word.
“if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.” (Rev 18:22 ESV)
It would be wise for every Teacher of God’s Word to not change, take away, or modify any part of His revelation, and not just the Book of Revelation, found in the entire Bible which He gave to human beings to write down.
