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Saturday, May 19, 2012

The inerrant Bible is the Holy Bible

Romans 1:1-3Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, 2which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh,

Yesterday we considered why the Holy Bible is the Holy Bible.  We looked at its characteristics in light of what we have studied in the realm of holiness.  Having seen that the Bible alone can be considered "Holy" or "Sacred" in the authoritative sense, today we want to elaborate on the one trait that demonstrates the Bible to be "The Holy Bible" - inerrancy. 

The scripture is pure and undefiled, qualifying it to predict events accurately.
Holiness or sacredness includes purity. Theologians refer to the scriptures as being inerrant and infallible - that is, without error and incapable of error. Five phrases above lead us to the thought of how crucial inerrancy is to the Holy character of scripture:
1. "the Gospel of God" or the Message of the inerrant scripture

2. "promised before hand" (i.e predictive prophecy) or the Method of inerrant scripture

3. "through his servants the prophets" or the Means by which came inerrant scripture

4. "in the Holy Scriptures" or the Manufacturing of inerrant scripture

5. "concerning His Son" or the Majesty of Christ, the focus of inerrant scripture

In order for the Bible to predict events accurately, it had to be without error. Now lets break these series of phrases down to explain further why biblical inerrancy is necessary in order the Holy Bible to be the Holy Bible:

a. The Message of Inerrant Scripture - "The Gospel of God." This is the "Good News" of God's Mission to rescue sinful man from the death of sin. It was first proclaimed in Genesis 3:15 and throughout the 10 generations from Adam to Noah in Genesis 5-6. Abraham heard it in Genesis 12,15,17. Isaac and jacob and the Patriarchs were repeated the "promise" of the Gospel throughout the rest of Genesis.

b. The Method of Inerrant Scripture - "Promised before hand".
Moses later on spoke of this promise of the Gospel and predicted a Prophet to come in Deuteronomy 18. David was promised the coming of a King from his blood line in 2 Samuel 7:13-16. By the time we reach the New Testament, we discover that in all, 332 prophecies were made about Jesus Christ, the subject of all prophecy. If one of those predictions had been wrong, the whole fabric of scripture would had unraveled.

c. The Means by which came inerrant scripture - "Through His Servants the prophets".
If the Gospel was the message, and the predictions and promises were the method, then the prophets themselves were the means through which God revealed the Holy Scriptures. These men wrote as they were "carried along" by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:21). Those  men were at times sinful, yet the Spirit of God gave the Grace of inspiration in order to preserve what they wrote from error. No other book had this Divine protection accompanying its composition like the Bible - thus making it Holy.

d.The Manufacture of inerrant scripture -  "In the Holy Scriptures"
With the Holy message, method and means we now come to the Holy manufacturing of the scriptures themselves. They are termed "Holy Scriptures". In order to be Holy, they were not merely "deemed Holy", they were Holy. The level of holiness invested in the sacred text of scripture is such that they are without error.

e. The Majesty of Christ, the focus of inerrant scripture - "Concerning His Son"
The Majesty of the Son is the focal point of all scripture. What would happpen if the message would had been inaccurate? Or how about the method - predictive prophecy? What if the Holy Spirit had not preserved the means of communication - the prophets words? Or how about the manufacturing of the scriptures in their original form? If any part of that process would had been unholy - we would not know the Holy Majesty of Christ.

As you can see, if the Bible had even one error, it would not be pure and thus it would be incapable of accurately communicating the Majesty of Jesus Christ.  For these reasons the inerrancy of scripture is why we can see that the Holy Bible is the Holy Bible.