Hold Fast # 3

Hold Fast # 3

How and in what manner this was done, I can no more explain than I can the union of two natures, God and man, in the Person of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. I only know that there is both a Divine and a human element in the Bible, and that, while the men who wrote it were really and truly men, the book that they wrote and handed down to us is really and truly the Word of God. I know the result - but I do not understand the process. The result is, that the Bible is the written Word of God; but I can no more explain the process, than I can explain how the water became wine at Cana, or how five loaves fed five thousand men, or how the Apostle Peter walked on the water, or how a few words from our Lord's lips raised Lazarus from the dead. I do not pretend to explain miracles, and I do not pretend to explain fully the miraculous gift of inspiration.

The position I take up is, that while the Bible writers were not "machines" as some sneeringly say - they only wrote what God taught them to write. The Holy Spirit put into their minds thoughts and ideas, and then guided their pens in writing and expressing them. Even when they made use of old records, chronicles, pedigrees, and lists of names, as they certainly did, they adopted, used, and compiled them under the direction of the Holy Spirit. When you read the Bible, you are not reading the unaided, self-taught composition of erring men like yourselves - but thoughts and words which were given by the eternal God. The men who were employed to write the Scripture "spoke not from themselves". They "spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit." (2 Peter 1:21). He who holds a Bible in his hand should remember that he holds not the word of man - but of God. He holds a volume which not only contains - but is God's Word!

In saying all this, I would not be mistaken. I only claim complete inspiration for the original languages in which the books of the Scripture were written. I admit fully that transcribers and translators were not infallible, and that occasional mistakes may have crept into the sacred text, though amazingly few. When, therefore, some critics object to a word or a verse here and there, reason would tell us - that we should bear with them patiently, and agree to differ. Difficulties about the meaning of many places in the Bible, apparent discrepancies, obscure passages, no doubt, there always will be. But the book, as a whole, contains nothing that is not true.

But unhappily the battle of inspiration does not end here. A school of men has risen among us, who boldly deny the inspiration of large portions of the Old Testament. The book of Genesis, for example, is declared by some to possess no Divine authority, and to be only a collection of interesting fictions. I can find no words to express my entire disagreement with such theories. I maintain firmly - that the Old Testament is of equal authority with the New, and that they stand or fall together. You cannot separate them, any more than you can separate the warp and woof in a piece of woven cloth. The writers of the New Testament continually quote the words of the Old Testament, as of equal authority with their own, and never give the slightest hint that these quotations are not to be regarded as the Word of God. The thrice-repeated saying of our Lord, taken from Deuteronomy, "It is written," when tempted by the devil, is deeply significant and instructive. (Matt. 4:5-10).

But this is not the whole of my objection to these modern theories. I contend that attacks on Genesis in particular involve most dangerous consequences. Then tend to dishonor our Lord Jesus Christ and His apostles. That they regard the events and persons mentioned in Genesis as real, historical, and true, and not fictitious - is clear to any honest reader of the New Testament. Now, how can this be explained if Genesis is, as some say, a mere collection of fiction? You cannot explain it except on the supposition that our Lord and His Apostles were ignorant, and did not know as much as modern critics do - or else that they secretly suppressed their knowledge in order to avoid offending their hearers. In short, they were either fallible or fallacious, deceived or deceivers. God forbid that we should adopt either one conclusion or the other! I frankly confess that my whole soul revolts from these modern teachings about Genesis.

When I read that our Lord Jesus Christ is "One with the Father," that "in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge," that He is "the Light of the world," my mind cannot conceive the possibility of His being ignorant, as latter-day theories about Genesis certainly imply. That blessed Saviour to whom I am taught to commit my soul, in the very week that He died for my redemption, spoke of the Flood and the days of Noah as realities! If He spoke ignorantly, with Calvary in full view, it would shake to the foundation my confidence in His power to save me, and would destroy my peace. I abhor the idea of an ignorant Saviour! From all distrust of any part of the Bible - may you ever be delivered. How any English clergyman can read a lesson from Genesis in church, if he does not believe its inspiration, I cannot understand. And how after this he can gravely ascend the pulpit, select a text from Genesis, preach a sermon on the text, and draw lessons from it, when he does not believe in his heart that the text he has chosen was given by inspiration; this, I say, is one of those things which fill my soul with amazement, and make me tremble for the ark of God.

Well and wisely has this age been called "an age of downgrade theology." The man who only admit a partial inspiration of the Bible, has been justly compared to one with his head in a fog and his feet on a quicksand. From theories like these may you ever be preserved!

3. In the next place, let me charge you to hold fast the old doctrine of the sinfulness of sin, and the corruption of human nature. I can find no words to express my sense of the vastness and importance of this subject. It is my firm conviction that a right knowledge of sin lies at the root of all saving religion. The first thing that God does when He makes a man a new creature in Christ - is to send light into his heart,and show him that he is a guilty sinner. The material creation in Genesis began with "light," and so also does the spiritual creation. I have an equally firm conviction that a low and imperfect view of sin, is the origin of most of the errors, heresies, and false doctrines of the present day. If a man does not realize the extent and dangerous nature of his soul's disease, you cannot wonder if he is content with false or imperfect remedies. I believe that one of the chief wants of the Church in the nineteenth century has been, and is, clearer, fuller teaching about sin.

~J. C. Ryle~

(continued with # 4)