We Believe the Bible (Series on the EFCA Statement of Faith) 2 Timothy 3:15-17 7/11/2010 I believe in God. I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the church. I believe in the Bible. And you may be sitting here this morning and saying, “Yep, me too.” But what if I were talking about Allah and not Yahweh, now do we believe in the same God? A muslim would emphatically tell you no, and he would be right to say so, and we would be right to believe that we do not believe in the same God. And what if my statement that I believed in Jesus simply meant that I believed the human being called Jesus Christ was a good moral teacher. You may agree with that, but I believe that Jesus Christ is the God-man, God made flesh, and that he alone is able to pay the penalty for sin. But you wouldn’t have known that if I simply stated that I believe in Jesus Christ and gave no further information. Some of you may be wondering, why in the world are we spending any time looking at a document, the statement of faith of the Evangelical Free Church, a document that is merely written by human beings and is not a means of God’s salvation or a document of absolute authority for our lives as Christians - why spend any time with it? Let me give you 3 reasons that I think it’s important that we take time as the worshipping community here at Grace to look at our statement of faith together. First, a statement of faith brings definition and clarity. I can claim to believe in God, but without defining what that means it’s not very clear what I’m actually saying. When I define what I mean I remove confusion and bring clarity to my intention in making the statement in the first place. The second reason for us to take some time to look at our statement of faith is that a statement of faith is brief. We simply cannot state all that we believe, all the arguments, all the thoughts, all the intricacies of our beliefs about the Christian faith whenever someone asks us what it is that we believe. So a statement of faith allows us to succinctly and compactly cull out the most essential tenets of the faith we profess as disciples of Jesus Christ, and be reminded of the core beliefs of our faith. Third, we need to look at our statement of faith to know for sure that the beliefs it asserts are biblically sound. Our statement of faith would be completely worthless if what it defines, clarifies, and succinctly states as Christian belief is not throughly and completely grounded in the Bible’s teaching. So today, we’ll look at the second article of our statement of faith, the Bible, and see what it is that the statement of faith says about the Bible and look at some of the implications of our beliefs about the Bible for our lives. The statement of faith of the Evangelical Free Church, of which we are an affiliate church, says this about the Bible: “We believe that God has spoken in the Scriptures, both Old and New Testaments, through the words of human authors. As the verbally inspired Word of God, the Bible is without error in the original writings, the complete revelation of His will for salvation, and the ultimate authority by which every realm of human knowledge and endeavor should be judged. Therefore, it is to be believed in all that it teaches, obeyed in all that it requires, and trusted in all that it promises.” This statement brings definition and clarity to what we say we believe about the Bible. So it meets the first reason for looking at this together. It is also brief, a mere 5 lines, and makes some essential statements about what we believe about the Bible so it meets the second reason for looking at this as a church community. But is it biblical, does this statement on the Bible assert what the Bible teaches about itself? In other words, what the statement says we believe about the Bible does the Bible actually teach this? Why is this question important? It’s important because, for a Christian, the Bible is the authoritative source for all that we believe about God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Church, salvation, and the Bible to name just a few things. It’s also important to know what we believe about the Bible because it is also provides a resource for knowing how to live our lives as disciples of Jesus Christ. This morning we’re going to look in broad strokes at what the statement of faith of the Evangelical Free Church has to say about what we believe about the Bible. The apostle Paul will serve as our guide as we look briefly at his words to Timothy on the subject of the Bible. So grab a Bible and please turn with me to 2 Timothy 3:15-17. In this brief passage, Paul makes three statements about the Bible that we need to pay attention to. He speaks to Timothy about the Bible’s source or it’s origin, about the Bible’s substance or purpose, and about the Bible’s significance or it’s applicability to real life. In verse 16 Paul writes, “All scripture is God-breathed”. God is the Bible’s, is scripture’s, source; the Bible originates in and from God. But what does Paul mean by saying that ALL SCRIPTURE is God-breathed? In the immediate context Paul is speaking of the 39 books of the Old Testament, Genesis - Malachi. In Paul’s time the canon of the Old Testament was closed and these 39 books were considered to be the authoritative word of God. We as the church, also believe that the 27 books of the New Testament, Matthew - Revelation, rise to the level of authoritative scripture and include them in our definition of all scripture. Therefore, all scripture as viewed in the time of the church consists of the 66 books which make up the Bible you are holding this morning. I don’t have the time this morning to go into a detailed argument as to why these 66 books, the Old and New Testament combined are the authoritative scriptures that Christians embrace. There are many books and articles that can speak with more depth as to the reasoning and history of the canon of scripture and I would be happy to direct your attention to some of these resources if you’re interested. Defining the scope of scripture, Paul then speaks directly about the Bible’s source saying it is GODBREATHED. Scripture, the Bible, does not exist on its own, it exists because God has spoken it. God is not dependent upon the Bible for his existence, however the Bible is dependent upon God having spoken it, having literally as the wording here indicates, breathed it out, for its existence. To be God-breathed means that the scriptures originated in God’s mind, and were communicated from God’s mouth by God’s breath or God’s Spirit. This process, in theological language is referred to as inspiration. Inspiration is the process by which God moved human authors to write down what He wanted to communicate to mankind about himself, what he wanted to communicate to man about man, and most importantly what God wanted to communicate to humans about salvation. Although not in this passage, I believe that not only did God inspire human authors to write what he wanted to communicate, but the very words that the human authors chose were also inspired, breathed out by God, so that we not only have what God wanted to communicate to man, we have it the way that God wanted it communicated. The Bible, all scripture, finds it’s source wholly and completely in God alone. All scripture is God-breathed. The second statement Paul makes to Timothy about the Bible regards it’s substance. We have to look back at verse 15 to see an aspect of the substance of the Bible. Beginning at verse 14, Paul writes, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it (Paul referring to himself and Timothy’s mother and Grandmother), and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, (and here’s the substance Paul speaks about) which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus”. Of all the things that the Bible addresses, its primary substance revolves around the person of Jesus Christ, and the salvation that comes through faith in Jesus Christ.. From beginning to end the consistent story line of the Bible is the salvation that will come through the savior that God will send to once and for all deal with the hellish consequences of sin. While I think salvation through faith in Christ is the primary substance or purpose of the Bible, it is not it’s only substance. Although not stated in this passage, another purpose of the Bible is it’s truthfulness and it’s authority for the life of a Christian. With regard to it’s truthfulness, the writer of Proverbs 30 reminds us that, “Every word of God is flawless, he is a shield to those who take refuge in him”. And John in his gospel remembers the words Jesus spoke in his prayer for all believers in John 17:17 saying, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth”. God is truthful and his words are true and this second substance or purpose of the Bible attests to God’s truthful nature. 1 Samuel 15:29 declares, “He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a man, that he should change his mind”. When God speaks he means it, and it can be trusted. Another point of substance or purpose of the Bible is to teach and remind Christians that the Bible is authoritative over every area of life. There is nothing that we deal with in life that does not come under the teaching and instruction of the Bible. This does not mean that the Bible addresses in detail or even by way of allusion all of the myriad of experiences and situations that we will have in our lives, however, the principles of scripture and the teaching of scripture are the grid through which a Christian is to view life and live life. The Bible is substantive over every aspect of reasoning and life. And this leads to the third statement Paul makes to Timothy about the Bible - the Bible is significant for the life of a disciple of Jesus Christ. Looking at verse 16 again Paul writes, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work”. Paul covers four areas of significance for scripture, teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. In short, as Paul says, the Bible is useful, it is significant for the life of a disciple. This is why you’ll find Grace Church consistently making a big deal about the Bible in all of the ministries that we offer here at Grace. Think about it, Growth Groups are about coming together in smaller groups to study the Bible. AWANA’s primary emphasis is the memorization of the Bible, we encourage all of you in the body throughout the year to engage in memorizing scripture with our monthly scripture memory passage, sermons revolve around and are grounded in the Bible, Youth Groups study the Bible together. This is also why we’re serious about you taking a Bible if you don’t have one at home. We sincerely want you reading and studying the Bible as often as possible because we believe it IS significant for your life. Almost everything we do, as a church is influenced by and focused upon the Bible. The Bible is useful in the life of a believer and it is significant for the lives of Christians. Why is the Bible significant for the life of a disciple? Paul offers four reasons, through the Bible we are taught about God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, and as he said before we are taught about salvation itself. Through the Bible we’re rebuked by the scriptures, meaning that the Bible can show us our errors. Through the Bible we’re corrected by the Bible, meaning that the Bible helps to restore us to right practices and true understanding of God. And through the Bible we’re trained in righteousness; in other words, it is a sure guide to living holy, righteous, and God honoring lives. Why is it important to allow the Bible to teach, rebuke, correct, and train us verse 17 says, so that the man of God, the woman of God, may be throughly equipped for every good work, meaning we embrace the significance of the Bible for our lives so that we’re ready to do what God wants us to do. The point is this, the Bible is worthy of our time, reflection, and action. We need to be in the word, we need to make bible reading and bible study a high high priority in our lives, and I hope you will make the decision even today to do so. In these three verses from 2 Timothy 3:15-17, we learn of the Bible’s source - which is God, we learn of the Bible’s substance - which is it’s revelation of salvation in Christ, it’s truthfulness, and it’s authority in our lives, and we learn of the Bible’s significance - it teaches us about God, rebukes us when we are in error, corrects us by restoring us to truth, and trains us in righteousness so that we can be used by God for his purposes. So what about our statement of faith’s assertions about what we believe about the Bible. Does the article regarding the Bible agree with what the Bible says of itself? I think so. We believe that God has spoken in the scriptures, both Old and New Testaments, through the words of human authors. The statement of faith about the Bible agrees with the Bible’s teaching about it’s source - The Bible is God’s word. As the verbally inspired Word of God, the Bible is without error in the original writings, the complete revelation of his will for salvation, and the ultimate authority by which every realm of human knowledge and endeavor should be judged. The statement of faith regarding the Bible agrees with the Bible’s teaching about it’s substance - The Bible is truthful, is complete in it’s teaching about our salvation, and is authoritative over the totality of the Christian disciples life. Therefore, it is to be believed in all that it teaches, obeyed in all that it requires, and trusted in all that it promises. The statement of faith regarding the Bible agrees with the Bible’s teaching about it’s significance - The Bible is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, and deserves our obedience and trust. I believe the Bible’s source is God, the Bible’s substance is salvation, and the Bible’s significance is for my daily life. What do you believe? Let’s pray.