Many have over the years questioned the Word of God as the final authority. This is why there was major division, namely the Scopes Monkey Trial that went down in Dayton, TN. It was an actual trail between the Clarence Darrow (of ACLU) and former Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan. The word of God was actually on trail!
Truth is determined in three ways: human reasoning, ecclesial dogma, and biblical theology. The first one is rooted in humanism and science; the second is based on creeds and doctrines but the third is based in the actual truth itself: the bible!
It is clear that putting your trust in your own understanding or knowledge is the worship of self. In the same regard, having beliefs that just pass through the generations is equally just as dangerous. All truth must be trusted and trust must begin in the source of truth which is the scripture, namely the New Testament.
40 men over many centuries in several nations all wrote what we have to be the Canonized Bible today. There is no way that man could have done this. The only answer is inspiration of the Divine.
It might harm your post-modern friends but the word of God must be true!
Trusting the Scriptures
The idea that the Bible is the infallible rule for all faith and conduct is not new. This is the view of most movements down the generations. In other words, why personalities that wrote the books might influence the styles; the message of the Bible remains pure and it does not change.
J.W. Haley did a study in 1874 and found that most of the problems that people claim they have with the Word of God comes 8 false ideas.
- Failure to read the Bible as it reads.
- False Interpretations without understanding the cultural context.
- Wrong education about biblical things
- Failure to realize summaries
- Misunderstanding of societal differences (Babylon, Greek, Israel)
- The numbering system in the Bible
- Difference between autographs and manuscripts
- Change in meaning of words through history
However, all of this do not change the word of God and that it does become the guide or the rule of all things related to faith and godliness. The Bible, especially the New Testament is the measuring rod of standards for what it means to be a believer in Christ Jesus.
The test of being in the Bible was not easy. It was based on being Apostolic, universal, biblical harmony and being inspired by the Spirit. Only 26 books passed those test. The book of Revelation was added later after much debate. This was the standard until the modern psychology movement began in the late 1800’s.
It is word saying that the old copy of text (gospel of John) we have is about 30 years after the book was written. The oldest copy of Plato writings is 1,300 years later. We do not question the work of Plato so why should we question the work of Jesus?
Therefore, it is reasonable to say that we can believe the scriptures!
