THE INERRANT WORD OF GOD

…and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness…(2Tim. 3:15-16)

As we mature in our walk with God, we begin to understand how critical it is to be fully convinced of, and defend, the inerrancy of the Word of God. By inerrancy, we mean that every word in the sixty-six (66) books of our Bible is the Word of God and therefore inerrant (without error) in the original manuscripts (autographs). This is affirmed in such statement as issued by the Evangelical Theological Society, “The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs”. Why is it of utmost importance to maintain this conviction? For this very reason: if any word or part of the Bible can be declared as an error, then no portion of the Bible is free from doubt! Can you imagine how absolutely devastating this is to us who rely on the accuracy of the Word of God for our faith and salvation!

Therefore, we believe that every word in the Bible is divinely inspired by God, literally “God-breathed” (Gk. Theopneustos) to be written down for our benefit, regardless if they are directly spoken by Him, or, spoken or narrated by the biblical prophets and apostles. If the words of the Bible are God’s words, then it follows that these words are truthful and truth, for God cannot lie,

God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good? (Numb. 23:19)… in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began…(Tit. 1:2).

The highest authority and proof that the words in the Bible are the very words of God comes from Scripture itself. Hundreds of times the phrase “Thus says the LORD…” appears in the Old Testament, couples with numerous times God spoke through the prophets (1Ki. 14:18; 16:34; 1Ki. 13:21, 26; Zech. 7:7,12, etc.). Our Lord Jesus Himself and the apostles quoted various portions from the Old Testament as divinely authoritative over 295 times, with no qualms as to their divine origin or accuracy. Most famously, our Lord Jesus quoted directly from the Old Testament to defeat Satan and his temptations (Mt. 4:1-11), thus attesting to the divine origin and superior spiritual authority of the Old Testament words. Apostle Paul, writing to Timothy and referring to the Old Testament (2Tim. 3:16), affirmed that all Scripture is divinely inspired, that is, God-breathed. Apostle Peter not only referred to the Old Testament Scripture (Gk. Graphe) as God’s words, but also compared Paul’s epistles to “the rest of Scriptures”, thus affirming the words in Paul’s letters as the very words of God!

…knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2Pet. 1:20-21).…and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation—as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures. (2Pet. 3:15-16)

While we do not have the original writings of the words of God, we do have thousands of copies of the copies of the original biblical manuscripts of various ages, with some New Testament manuscripts dating back to mid-2^nd century. Through the rigorous academic discipline of textual criticism, we are confident that we have recovered at least 99% of the original writings of the words of God. Thus, we can safely say that the current manuscripts that we have are, for all intent and purpose, the same as the original manuscripts. Therefore, if the original manuscripts are inerrant, the manuscripts that we have are also deemed inerrant. Granted that we have various translations of the Bible in various languages from the original Hebrew and Greek texts, nevertheless we have the same Holy Spirit who originally inspired those texts to help us understand the words we read or hear, just He had done so the last 6000 years, especially during the long period when believers did not have the privilege of reading the complete Old and New Testaments.

However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. (Jn. 16:13)… But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him. (1Jn. 2:27)

We are confident in the inerrancy of Scripture because we believe God Himself expressly wants us to have His words and His truth. We acknowledge the enormous challenge of having the words of God written down by more than 40 diverse human authors over 1500 years, preserved, transmitted, and finally translated to what we have today in more than 3700 languages and dialects, and counting. This humanly speaking impossible task is made possible by the sovereign superintendence of the Almighty God who desires to redeem fallen humanity whom He had created in love and to bring many sons to glory!

Ultimately, the inerrancy of the God-breathed words in the Bible is self-attesting. Those of us who read the Bible with a seeking heart will indeed have our eyes opened and our hearts burn within us, and will affirm that we hear the risen Saviour speaking to us from the words of the Bible with a life-transforming power which no other writings have. Therefore, may we be thankful to God and appreciate the words of God in the Bible that we have, and diligently seek to read and hear God speaking to us daily!

(Note: We highly recommend readers to read “The Doctrine of the Word of God” in Wayne Grudem’s book, “Systematic Theology”, from which this article made numerous references.)