Inerrancy and Inspiration

Mark Kuhn
Writing Style Used: APA
Course and Section Number: Theo 201 B21

Short Essay on Inerrancy and Inspiration
The authority of the Bible is something that has been discussed by many people and for thousands of years. Our generation has a problem about authority. In church and in state we use the word ‘authority’ in different ways, some positive, and some negative. We use it in secular senses. We say of a great footballer that he stamped his authority on the game. (Wright) The Bible itself teaches about God and His dealing with human beings and the rest of creation. Determining the authority of the Bible has existed since it was written.
Within the church, the question of what we mean by authority has had particular focal points. It has practical questions to it. What does it mean to say that the Bible has authority? Where does the authority come from? We can answer these questions by reading the Bible and using biblical hermeneutics to help us determine the answer to these questions.
The Bible has authority because of the belief that God has given of himself in the Bible so that man can come to know Him. For me, it is an understanding of what the Biblical author was trying to say to his day and applying that truth to my day. I must be able to take the text of the Bible and show people how and why I am not free to interpret the Bible to say what I want it to say.
The authority of the Bible comes from a single source, God. The Bible had 36 authors, possibly 40, who wrote 66 books of the Bible. It was written over 1600 years with various authors beginning with Moses and ending with John. The Bible was written over 55 generations, yet there remains a singular unity. Only God who transcends all time could be its source. Thus giving authority to the truths written within to anyone who believes the text of the Bible. (Towns, 2008, p. 54)
I have heard it said that the Bible was written by men and therefore cannot be truth. That the Bible is just stories made up by men and that God had nothing to do with the Bible. What these people have not come to realize yet is that these men were inspired by the Holy Ghost that was sent by God. The secular world today has many different meanings for the word inspiration but in biblical terms, inspiration was a supernatural influence of the Holy Spirit among the sacred writers and their writings in which their writings became authoritative and trustworthy.
If asked for scripture that talks about inspiration, I would point out 2 Timothy 3:16, John 17:17, and 2 Peter 1:21, God had sovereignty and concursively been preparing the writers for the instrumental task so that they willingly and naturally recorded God’s revelation in the way he required. (Towns, 2008, p. 1242)
‘The inerrancy of the Bible means simply that the Bible tells the truth. Truth can and does include approximations, free quotations, language of appearances, and different accounts of the same event as long as those do not contradict.’ (Ryrie, 1981, p. 16). Psalms 12:6 ESV tells us, The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times. 1 Timothy 6:3-5, indicates that there are many false teachers and if they do not teach the truth of God’s word, then that person is not conveying truth.
As I mentioned earlier, I would indicate that even though a person did the actually writing of the scripture, all scripture was given by the Holy Spirit and written down by man. In Matthew 5:17-18, Jesus defends himself against charges that he defied the law by insisting that He came to fulfill both the law and prophets which together amount to the entire Old Testament.
In Galatians 3:16, scripture uses tense or a verb or noun to extend inerrancy in every detail. The use of the singular “seed” is Paul’s biblical basis for saying that Christ is the one who fulfilled God’s promises to Abraham. Inspiration comes for the teachings of the Bible which requires inerrancy, therefore, making this the strongest argument for inerrancy. While understanding the tense of a verb or noun makes understanding inerrancy and interpretation a little more difficult or weakest of the arguments for inerrancy.
Psalms 12:6 talks about the inerrancy of God’s word. God’s word is pure. If we believe what is written in Psalms 12:6 then we believe that the Psalmist was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write what God had intended for him to write and that those words would be true. I believe that the words that were written by men were inspired by the Holy Spirit as God’s way of revealing Himself to man. I believe in the inerrancy of the Bible but question mans many interpretations of the Bible. Man desires to be in the place of God and his interpretations have many errors in them. Making man a false God and taking away from the inspiration and inerrancy of the one true God.
Word Count: 846

Bibliography
Ryrie, C. C. (1981). What you should know about inerrancy. Retrieved from https://bible.org/seriespage/bible-inerrant-word-god
Towns, E. L. (2008). Bibliography. In Theology for today. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Wright, N. T. (n.d.). How Can The Bible Be Authoritative? by N.T. Wright. Retrieved from http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Bible_Authoritative.htm

Bibliography: In Theology for today. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning. Wright, N. T. (n.d.). How Can The Bible Be Authoritative? by N.T. Wright. Retrieved from http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Bible_Authoritative.htm