Chapter 1: God Speaks: Revelation, Inspiration, and Authority

The God who speaks

The Bible opens with a God who speaks. “And God said, Let there be light: and there was light” (Genesis 1:3). “By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth” (Psalm 33:6). Creation itself came by the word of God. A God who speaks the universe into being is also a God who can, and does, speak to the creatures he made.

Scripture calls this revelation: God making known what could not be known otherwise. It describes two kinds. General revelation is God’s witness in creation and conscience: “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork” (Psalm 19:1; Romans 1:19-20; 2:14-15). It shows that God exists and is powerful and good, but it cannot tell us how sinners are saved. Special revelation is God’s saving self-disclosure in history, in his words, and in his Son: “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son” (Hebrews 1:1-2).

Three senses of “the Word of God”

The Bible uses the phrase “the word of God” in three connected ways.

The living Word, Jesus Christ. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:1, 14). Christ is the full and final revelation of the Father (Hebrews 1:3; Revelation 19:13).

The written Word, the Scriptures. Jesus treated the written text as the voice of God: “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).

The proclaimed Word, the gospel preached. Paul thanked God that the Thessalonians “received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe” (1 Thessalonians 2:13).

These three are not rivals. The written Word bears witness to the living Word (John 5:39), and the preached Word is the written Word made known. We know Christ through the Scriptures, and we rightly understand the Scriptures only as they point to him (Luke 24:27, 44).

Inspiration: the Bible’s claim about itself

The central text is 2 Timothy 3:16: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” The Greek word translated “given by inspiration of God” is theopneustos, literally “God-breathed.” The Scriptures are not merely about God’s breath; they are its product. Peter explains the means: “no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter 1:20-21).

Three points follow.

God is the source. The human writers did not invent their message. They were “moved” or “carried along” by the Spirit (2 Peter 1:21).

Human writers were truly involved. The writers kept their own vocabulary, style, personality, and circumstances. Isaiah does not sound like Paul, and Luke’s Greek is not John’s. God spoke through real people without erasing them. This is why the evangelical church has spoken of a dual authorship: fully human and fully divine.

It extends to the words. Jesus rested an argument on a single word of Psalm 82 and added, “the scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35). Paul argued from the singular “seed” rather than “seeds” (Galatians 3:16). Both treat the very words of Scripture as carrying God’s authority.

Truth, reliability, and authority

If God breathed out the Scriptures, they share his character. “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times” (Psalm 12:6). “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth” (John 17:17). God “cannot lie” (Titus 1:2; Hebrews 6:18). Christians have therefore confessed that the Scriptures are inerrant (without error in what they affirm) and infallible (not leading astray). Jesus held the same high view: “one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled” (Matthew 5:18).

The same God-breathed quality gives the Bible its authority. Jesus answered Satan, the Sadducees, and the Pharisees alike with “It is written” and “Have ye not read?” (Matthew 4:4, 7, 10; 22:31). The church of the first centuries took the same stand. Justin Martyr describes Sunday worship in Rome around AD 150, where “the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read” (Justin, 1 Apol. 67). The Reformers later gathered the principle into the phrase sola scriptura: Scripture alone is the final and infallible rule of faith. The Westminster Confession of 1646 states it plainly: “The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself” (Westminster Confession 1.9).

Sufficiency and power

The Bible claims to be enough for what it was given to do. “The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple” (Psalm 19:7). It “is able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” and equips the believer “thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Timothy 3:15, 17). It is also alive: “the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). And it does not fail: “So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please” (Isaiah 55:11).

Jerome, who spent his life translating the Bible, put it this way in the preface to his commentary on Isaiah: ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ (Jerome, Comm. Isa., prol.).

Summary. The Word of God is God’s own speech: living in Christ, written in Scripture, and proclaimed in the gospel. It is inspired, true, authoritative, sufficient, and powerful. The rest of this book asks how that Word came into our hands, and why we can trust that what we hold is it.