This We Believe
The Bible, The Word of God by James H. Christian, Th.D. Dean of the College; Professor of Church History-Seminary day the conviction grew upon me that I must settle this question to my own complete satisfaction once and for all. At that time I had not read John Lea’s The Book of Books and its Wonderful Story, but I believed what he said in the first sentence: “The founda tion upon which Christianity is based is that the Bible is true, that it is God’s revelation to man concerning matters which are of supreme impor tance in relation to human destiny, and that it is the only reliable source of information in this respect.” I rea soned that through my study I would decide that the Bible is completely the Word of God or it is not. If it is, I would continue to prepare for Chris tian service. If it is not, I would leave the seminary at once, for there was no use in spending my time pre paring to teach or to preach something of which I could not be sure. In my distress I conveyed my feel ings to some of my fellow students. They frankly said that I was laying too much importance upon too small a matter. What difference did it make whether the entire Bible is the Word of God or whether the great truths only of the Bible are inspired? Are not the great truths enough to save men? My reply was that they are not. If man is to be the judge of what the great truths of the Bible are, man might lay emphasis upon things which are not great truths. Perhaps even the greatest doctrine of the Bible in our eyes, the atonement through Jesus Christ, might not be one of these great 4
T h e B ib l e is the Word of God! This is the declaration of the apostle Paul in II Timothy 3:16: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteous ness: That the man of God may be per fect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” When I entered theological semin ary to prepare for Christian service, I believed this verse implicitly. How ever, during the first year, my faith was shaken by one of my respected and learned professors. It was his con tention that the Bible is the Word of God but that it is not all the inspired Word of God. He believed that the great truths of the Bible were inspired, but that surrounding these great truths were details supplied by the writers of Scripture which were not inspired by God. These details surrounding the great truths might, in fact, be quite erroneous. Instinctively I jumped emo tionally to a defense of my cherished belief in the complete inspiration of the Word of God, but I found that emotion and simple conviction were not enough, for the arguments which the professor used were themselves convicting a n d evidenced consider able thinking. Moreover, I was struck by the fact that at the beginning of this particular lecture, he had stated that he once believed that every word in the Bible was inspired, but that through study he had changed his opinions to his present position. As I thought through the matter that
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