THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE!

THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE!

2 Tim 3:16-17

16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

          What is it about the Bible, out of all other books written, that makes it so special; so worthy of controversy? Perhaps it is because it addresses the oozing essence of man. It is profitable for doctrine; the transmission of useful information. It is useful for correction, epanorthosis, which literally means “a straightening up.” The word used for “instruction” actually indicates disciplinary correction and is different from and stronger than epanorthosis. The word paideia, which is translated instruction means “tutorage or chastisement.”

          The Old English word “throughly,” which we generally think is a misspelling of the word “thoroughly” actually contains nuances that go beyond our more modern word. The Greek exartizo means “to finish out.” The idea is similar to but more complete than our modern word.

          When reading the Bible, it is clear that while written by a man or men, it springs from a well much deeper than man. The word “inspiration” is from the Greek theopneustos from theo meaning God and pneo meaning “to breathe.” So we can conclude that the breath of God; that same breath that breathed life into the formed clay of the first man, breathed or whispered the very words of God into the heart and mind of the writer. When we read the Bible we are reading a letter from God.

          I found a quote in my files that may help us to understand the majesty of the Bible. “I can just come to imagine for myself that a man of more or less my own biological and social composition could have written Hamlet or Lear and gone home to lunch and found a normal answer to the question "How did it go today?" I cannot conceive of the author of the Speech Out of the Whirlwind in Job writing or dictating that text and dwelling within common existence and parlance.”

   -- George Steiner, in a New Yorker review of  The Literary Guide to the Bible, edited by Robert Alter and Frank Kermode.  Christianity Today, Vol. 32, no. 15.

          Every now and then, a writer of the Bible would simply explode while describing the transfer of information by inspiration. Consider this verse:

Rom 11:33-36

33 O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!

34 For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?

35 Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?

36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

Dear God beyond the cosmos, help our frail minds to grasp the unimaginable by laying hold on Thee. AMEN