The Inerrancy Of The Bible
The Holy Bible • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Introduction
Introduction
Greetings…
Today, we are going to examine a lesson that I think is vital in our studies with those outside church building doors.
That is we are going to look at “The Inerrancy Of The Bible.”
In other words we are going to ask the question, “does the bible have contradictions” or “does the bible demonstrate itself to be perfectly harmonious.”
89 Forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens.
Now before we dive into the “numbers” if you will that demonstrate the inerrancy of the bible let us first begin by showing what God makes very known throughout his word, and that is…
God Is Perfect
God Is Perfect
In Every Way.
In Every Way.
We find this truth declared over and over.
31 This God—his way is perfect; the word of the Lord proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.
30 As for God, His way is perfect; The word of the Lord is proven; He is a shield to all who trust in Him.
48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
If God is perfect then it would prove true that what ever he inspired would not be found to have error but rather be perfect as well.
God clearly states that the bible is his inspired work through man.
2 Timothy 3:16 (ESV)
16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness
2 Timothy 3:16 (NKJV)
16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness
Deuteronomy 32:4 (ESV)
4 The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.
Because God is perfect and he inspired the perfect work of the bible it would seem that God would somewhere or somehow explain how his word is perfect.
James 1:25 (ESV)
25 But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.
Summary
Summary
So it is without doubt that God clearly claims within his holy word that not only he is perfect but everything he does is therefore perfect.
However, most people alive today in this world do not believe the bible is perfect and without error.
Many people, even those that claim to be Christians have a different concept of the bible.
In speaking about Jesus and the New Testament, Joe Rogan once told a gust on his podcast, “Even if it is the writings of Jesus, even if all that is unadulterated. Its not been altered by human beings, its still put together by people, written down by people, and very different than the Old Testament.”
This is a common argument made by many that even if God did inspired the first person to write each of the sixty-six books they have been altered over the years by those that made copies, like how the phone call game works.
In fact Joe Rogan’s guest said he remembered in college that they had his class one time sit in a long row and do the telephone game.
His guest then said, and I quote, “That made me never want to, like, check out the bible anymore.”
What this young man said is not an uncommon thought we the majority of people in this world.
They actually believe the bible, because we do not have any of the original MSS, has been corrupted to the point that we cannot know what God, if he did have it written, actually was saying.
Now, to be clear, if you believe in God but limit his ability to keep his word perfect, you don’t really believe in the God of the bible but some made up divine being.
But that simply will not be a sufficient argument for someone that does not believe the bible to be God’s inspired and inerrant word today.
So, how to we help the growing contention of people that believe the bible is not full of errors?
One of the easiest and in my experience most effective is to begin with the…
Manuscript Evidence
Manuscript Evidence
The New Testament.
The New Testament.
We obviously could spend a large amount of time going through both the Old and New Testament MSS.
However, it would be more efficient to just look at the New Testament because both are said to be “inspired and thus a perfect work of God” and if the New Testament hasn’t been corrupted then it stands to reason that the Old has not either.
The most up-to-date Greek New Testament, that is based on the most up-to-date MSS evidence is the Novum Testamentum Graece (NA28).
In the Greek New Testament there are a little over 138,000 words or to be precises 138,162 words.
A popular statement from those that do not believe the bible is inerrant will say things along the lines of, “there are more variants in the New Testament then there are words.”
This is actually a very big understatement because in the Greek N.T. alone the latest figures show we have right around 500,000 variants.
This doesn’t include the translations of the N.T. or the quotes from the “church fathers” that is the Greek MSS only.
If this was the only data we had the atheist would rejoice and the faithful would be as the apostle Paul put it, “most pitiful.”
Now the reason we have so many textual variants is because we have a lot of MSS.
If we only had “one MSS” it wouldn’t disagree with itself and we would have no variants, but would that tell you what the “original said” with any confidence, no!!!
We have approximately 5,800 Greek MSS.
We have approximately 10,000 Latin MSS.
We have approximately 9,300 MSS in other languages.
That is approximately 25,100 MSS altogether.
So the real question we need to ask then is…
What Kinds Of Variants Are There?
What Kinds Of Variants Are There?
Of the 500,000 variants that are found in the 138,000 words of the Greek N.T. MSS ninety-nine percent make virtually no difference at all.
By that I mean we are dealing with things like “difference in the spelling of a word.”
For example, the apostle John actually spells the same exact word three different ways in only eight verses.
So some “variants” are not variants but actually intended by the author.
Another illustration of this virtually no difference variants is in word order.
In the Greek word order doesn’t matter so if we were to find “John loves Martha” as in John 11:5 different scribes could write it in different orders.
Jesus loves Martha and/or Martha loves Jesus, and/or Loves Martha Jesus, etc…
In the Greek there are over 500 different ways to say “Jesus loves Martha” and all of them are textually and grammatically correct, but are still considered considered variants even though all 500 plus would be translated as “Jesus loves Martha.”
If you change just the verb construct of “love” the number of grammatically correct variations of “Jesus loves Martha” rises to over 1,200 different variants with all of them saying “Jesus loves Martha.”
Another illustration of his is in how names are spelled.
John in Greek can be spelled with the equivalent of “one n” in his name or “two n’s” in his name, we find MSS with both spellings and thus a variant.
This is why Bart Ehrman is wrote…
“We could go on nearly forever talking about specific places in which the texts of the New Testament came to be changed, either accidentally or intentionally…the examples are not just in the hundreds but in the thousands.”
What does all of that mean?
If we can say Jesus loves Martha over 1200 different ways without changing the meaning, the “number of textual variants for the N.T. is actually meaningless.
What actually means something is the “nature of the variants.”
What is percentage of the the meaningful and viable variant that changes the meaning of the text?
That percentage is less than 1/5th of 1 % of all the textual variants.
These look like Mark 9:29…
29 And he said to them, “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer.”
29 So He said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting.”
Most scholars believe due to the MSS, context and many other variables that “and fasting” was not in the original, but it is possible.
However, like with most of these variants (0.002 percent) it doesn’t actually change the theological issues concerning doctrinal truth and living a righteous life today.
Summary
Summary
The reason there are no doctrinal variants that change our faithfulness is because God was and is able to providentially protect his holy word.
30 As for God, His way is perfect; The word of the Lord is proven; He is a shield to all who trust in Him.
Conclusion
Conclusion
We know we can trust God’s word because of two powerful statements by Jesus while here on earth.
48 The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day.
35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.
Invitation
1 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; 2 but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
