THE FUNDAMENTALS: The Bible
September/October 2019 | VOLUME 29 | NUMBER 5
O How I Love Your Law
God’s people have always loved His Word. Clement of Rome, who ministered just after the apostles, instructed his readers, “Look carefully into the Scriptures, which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit.” Augustine is famously quoted as calling the Holy Scriptures “our letters from home.” Charles Spurgeon affirmed, “Within the Scripture there is a balm for every wound, a salve for every sore.” To this we, God’s people today, could all add our personal confirmation.
Occasionally one hears conservative Christians accused of making an idol out of the Bible (“bibliolatry”). To this slander I would simply reply, “Read Psalm 119!” From beginning to end the psalmist seeks, finds, and rejoices in God through His Holy Word. For example, in verses 97–104 he declares his ardent love and his profound loyalty to the Scriptures.
97. O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day.
98. Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies: for they are ever with me.
99. I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation.
100. I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.
101. I have refrained my feet from every evil way, that I might keep thy word.
102. I have not departed from thy judgments: for thou hast taught me.
103. How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
104. Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way.
Verses 98–100 proclaim that the Word is better than every source of human wisdom, whether it be the shrewdness of one’s adversaries (v. 98), the insight of one’s teachers (v. 99), or the discernment of the experienced (v. 100). Verses 101–104 show the Scripture’s value for practical living. When we keep God’s Word, it keeps us from going the wrong way (v. 101). We experience His sayings as sweet and delightful to our souls (v. 103). And as we understand His precepts, we reject every untrue path (v. 104).
But notice especially verse 102: “From your decisions I have not turned aside, for You Yourself have taught me” (author’s translation). To truly learn from God’s Word is to be taught by God Himself. The implication is plain: you cannot learn from God without learning from His personal communication, and you cannot submit to God without submitting to His personal instruction.
To love God is to love His Word.
This truth is exactly what is at stake in the many theological battles through the centuries over bibliology (the doctrine of the Bible). Against the heretic Marcion, the church maintained that all the Scriptures, the Old Testament as well as the New, are the Word of God. In the time of the Reformation, believers maintained that the Scriptures and not the institutional church are the final authority on matters of faith and practice, and they maintained the privilege of all believers to hear the Bible speak to them in their own language. Baptists suffered persecution for their conviction that their churches should be conducted according to the dictates of the Scriptures rather than those of the state. During the battles of the last century, fundamentalists stood for the complete inspiration and reliability of the Scriptures against the attacks of critical scholarship and liberal theology.
Today there are still conflicts surrounding God’s Word, from mockery by unbelievers, to the mistranslations by cults, to the undermining of language itself by postmodernism, to claims of new revelation or inspiration, to the denial of the Scripture’s sufficiency for life and godliness.
To understand and to stand against these continuing challenges, all Bible-believers must be grounded in the doctrine of the Scriptures. This issue of FrontLine does not pretend to cover all the issues (or any of them in depth), but it does outline some of the main areas of our understanding of the Scriptures. These include the Bible’s production as the words of God through His supernatural control over the human writers (“inspiration”), its preservation through time and dissemination to us through copies and translations, its scope (the “canon”), its fundamental understandability (“perspicuity”), its complete reliability (“infallibility” and “inerrancy”), and its adequacy for our salvation and growth in godliness today (“sufficiency”).
It is our fervent hope that God’s people will have our love kindled afresh for the Word and that we will all strive to make it our “meditation all the day.”
—David Shumate
Features:
Is It Safe to Stand?
Ben Heffernan
Is the Bible free from all errors, and on what basis do we know?
How the Word of God Has Been Passed Down to Us
David Shumate
At some point believers must wonder how God’s Word came to us.
The Canon of Scripture
Keith Gephart
Not every book that claims special revelation is worthy of being included in the Bible.
Baptists and the Bible
Michael Sproul
Baptists have always had a love affair with the Word of God.
The Clarity of Scripture
Thomas Overmiller
Is the message of the Bible clear? Can you understand what it says?
Overwhelmed by Life’s Challenges
Jim Juvinall
What are we to do when it all seems so hopeless? Where are we to go for help?
Learning to Love and Live the Bible
John C. Vaughn
Even churches that would not self-identify as “Bible-believing” have some affinity for the Bible.
Departments:
Mail Bag & News from All Over
On the Home Front
The Widow’s Border
Martha Mazzaferro
Regional Report
On Language & Scripture
Mark L. Ward Jr.
At a Glance — Our Ancient Foe: Knowing the Enemy
Layton Talbert
Saying Goodbye
Carissa Fisher
The Lord Who Keeps His Promises
Jerry Sivnksty
(Originally published in FrontLine • September/October 2019. Click here to subscribe to the magazine.)