To finish out my little series on the doctrine of the Bible, we’re talking about the trustworthiness of scripture. The reality is that we can have confidence that it comes from God, and it’s His inspired, inerrant, infallible word for us.
Instead of doing a multi-part, shorter post, I’m giving the entire thing. My first long-form essay on here. Let me know what you think - do you prefer shorter emails or long ones like this?
But let’s dive in…
Establishing Ultimate Truth
I’ve watched enough detective shows and listened to enough true crime podcasts that I think I could probably solve a murder if I had to. I get how you go about investigating and proving murder.
But how do you go about proving that the Bible comes from God? How do you establish an ultimate truth.
Let me give an analogy. Hebrews 6:13-14, reads:
For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, saying, “Surely I will bless you and multiply you.”
Here’s the situation. God makes an oath to Abraham about his future. And typically, when you make an oath, you swear by something greater than you – there’s some sort of assurance that it’s real, it’s trustworthy, it’s true.
When I bought my house, the bank didn’t just say, “Sure, Dan seems like a good guy, I’m betting he’ll pay us back.” And The seller did the same. We shook hands, they gave me the keys, and we left. That’s not how it worked.
My wife and I signed 180 different documents saying, “If I prove untrustworthy, I’m swearing on the house that you can take it.” For a bank, real estate is more trustworthy than I am, and so I swear by the house that I’ll pay for it.
Likewise, when God makes an oath to Abraham, He reaches up and finds something more trustworthy to point to as collateral – And he goes all the way to the top – I swear by God Himself that I will bless you and multiply you.
To which you say, wait a second, that doesn’t count. God can’t swear to God. You have to swear by something different than you. The bank doesn’t care if I swear by Dan to pay my mortgage, that’s just taking me at my word, which we already said we can’t do. You have to swear by something greater.
But what is there that’s more trustworthy, more stable, more sure than God Himself? Since there’s nothing greater than God, he swears by Himself to Abraham.
When you are the foundation of truth, when you yourself are ultimate truth, there’s going to be a level of circuitousness to your appeals. It does no good to appeal to something less than yourself to establish truth, and so, you appeal to yourself. And then get accused of circular reasoning.
And it’s not fair, but the way we argue for trustworthiness is we reach for the rung above us to vouch for us. If you don’t trust me, trust my house for collateral. We go up one rung to prove our trustworthiness. But what happens when you’re top rung? When there’s nothing above you. When you have no equals. You have to swear by yourself.
If scripture is the ultimate truth, how do you want me to argue it’s truth? We argue truth from truth. From scripture for scripture. And it frustrates people, but it doesn’t need to.
Here’s John Frame:
The word of God, in the end, must authenticate itself. It cannot validate itself by appealing to something higher, because there is nothing higher. It cannot appeal to a higher standard, because it is itself the highest standard, the norming norm, the criterion of criteria. So it must appeal to itself.
If this appears circular, the same kind of circularity occurs whenever someone tries to validate a claim to ultimate authority. If someone believes that human reason, for example, is the ultimate authority, he can establish that only by a rational argument. Similarly, if a Muslim attempts to validate the Qur'an as ultimate authority, he must, in the final analysis, appeal to the Qur'an.”[1]
And so, while most people want clarity of what happened in the early church, that’s good and well, but it’s not ultimately decisive. It won’t prove the Bible’s inspiration. You can’t send history to do theology’s job.
But the fact that this is a theological question and not a historical one is profoundly good news. Here’s why.
Edwards’ Single Step
Jonathan Edwards had a deep missionary concern for the native Americans around Him in New England. So in the 1740s, he wrote this:
Miserable is the condition of the Houssatunnuck Indians and others, who have lately manifested a desire to be instructed in Christianity, if they can come at no evidence of the truth of Christianity, sufficient to induce them to sell all for Christ, in any other way but this [path of historical reasoning]…
The mind ascends to the truth of the gospel but by one step, and that is its divine glory. . . . Unless men may come to a reasonable solid persuasion and conviction of the truth of the gospel, by the internal evidences of it, in the way that has been spoken, viz. by a sight of its glory; ’tis impossible that those who are illiterate, and unacquainted with history, should have any thorough and effectual conviction of it at all.[2]
What Edwards is saying is that you don’t need to understand early church history and the process by which letters were canonized to believe – with solid reasoning – that the Bible has come from God. Rather, as you read it – or hear it – you see its glory – the glory of God in it – and that’s solid ground to trust it.
I recommended a book in my “Won’t You Read Along with Me” post, A Peculiar Glory by John Piper. It’s a book written to expand on that idea – that the sight of glory in the Bible is enough to prove it’s trustworthiness.
In that book, he gives this analogy.
In Matthew 3:17, and again in 17:5, a voice comes from heaven – both at Jesus’ baptism and on the mount of Transfiguration, saying “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
So therefore, during Jesus’ ministry, how did Jesus argue for His divine nature – His divine sonship? Not a single time did He refer to God speaking about Him from heaven. That’s what I would have done – “Hey, knuckleheads, remember how God spoke from the clouds calling me His Son?”
Rather, John 14:9 – He says to Philip, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.”
The better argument than having His position announced from heaven is simply being with Jesus. Being with Him should convince you of His glory. That’s why in John 1 we read, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).
The point here is that God was discernible in Jesus not because God… shouted Christ’s divinity from heaven, but because God was in Jesus. God was who Jesus was. They were united. The marks of divinity were in Jesus—the whole, acting, thinking, feeling, speaking person. So it is with the Scriptures. They do not have… a voice spoken over them. The word of man itself is united with the word of God. The marks of divinity are in the meaning of the writing.[3]
And so, I need to set up this post with a very specific question. It’s not about how to prove to a skeptic or unbeliever, or about determining how a Christian comes to believe, but I’m asking if there is a legitimate basis for believing that scripture is God’s word.[4]
And the answer is a resounding yes.
Which begs a second question – how do we see that legitimate basis?
To which John Calvin answers:
It's just the same as if we were asked How shall we learn to distinguish light from darkness, white from black, sweet from bitter? Scripture bears upon the face of it as clear evidence of its truth, as white and black do, with their color, sweet and bitter of their taste.[5]
Now, if you want further study on this topic, Canon Revisited is the place to go. It’s probably a College or maybe even seminary-level book. But in it, Mike Kruger breaks down this self-authenticating glory of scripture and gives these categories to think through: Divine Qualities, Apostolic Origin, and Corporate Reception. Let’s walk through them.
Divine Qualities
In my very first post on Revelation, I spent a good amount of time talking about how natural revelation gives witness to God – creation, conscience, reason. All these things, somehow, have divine imprints, God’s fingerprints on them. They are painted in a Godward way – that we can see His handwork in them.
The same is true of scripture. It bears the imprints, the fingerprints of God, letting us know it’s from Him. There’s beauty, there’s efficacy, there’s harmony. Those are the three categories from the Westminster Confession. They’re overlapping for sure, but let me explain each of them.
Beauty – of course – is a spiritual beauty.
It’s hard to explain beauty, isn’t it? It’s like trying to describe – to use Calvin’s categories – light or dark, black and white, bitter and sweet. But verses like 1 Corinthians 2:4–5 help us:
and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
There’s a natural, rhetorical beauty – like in, I don’t know, Cicero or Plato or Aristotle. And Paul says, don’t focus on that in my teaching (though he certainly spoke beautifully and with a rhetorical flourish), but rather, the beauty of the Spirit and power. The beauty that shows it’s from God, not men.
The beauty and excellency of scripture is why David, in Psalm 19:7–11, claims…
The law of the LORD is perfect…
the testimony of the LORD is sure …
the precepts of the LORD are right…
the commandment of the LORD is pure …
the rules of the LORD are true…
More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.
There’s this goodness, this beauty to scripture that testifies to itself. It testifies to the Spirit and His power.
We also see this through
The Power, or Efficacy of Scripture.
It is not simply that the Scriptures say that they are the revelation of God that is evidence for their being so, but also that they function as the word of God.[6]
Just think about what God’s word does. What else has all this power?[7]
It saves (2 Tim 3:15)
It points us away from ourselves toward God and others (2 Cor 5:15)
It teaches (Psa 119:97-100)
It rescues (Jud 23)
It warns (Heb 2:1-4)
It protects (Exo 19)
It encourages (Heb 13:5)
It motivates (Gal 6:9)
It confronts (Jas 1:22-25)
It convicts (1 Thess 1:5)
It guides (Psa 119:105)
The Bible does things that only God can do. The effects of it – the power of it – shows it to be from God.
Finally, there is harmony and unity in the Bible.
Kruger points to Doctrinal unity (its theological teachings are consistent). This is why we can do this kind of systematic study of theology. Because amazingly, Jeremiah and Jonah and John and Jude and James all believe the same things. We have united doctrine throughout the Bible.
There’s also Redemptive-Historical Unity (it tells one big story) and Structural Unity (based on God’s covenants) in the Bible showing that our Bible is whole.
Let me just give a couple of examples of this last thing I said – that the cannon is whole. That what we have as scripture is all the scripture, we’re not missing or adding anything.
The Old Testament is Complete
I think the best argument for the Old Testament being complete is that Jesus sees His Old Testament Bible as complete –that we’re not missing any books from it that should be tacked onto the end. Like the Apocrypha that you might see in some Catholic Bibles.
Ok, maybe you don’t know this. This is helpful background information. The Hebrew Bible is in a different order than our Old Testament. It’s the same 39 books, but arranged in three sections (we have 5).
It was the Law, the Prophets, and then the Writings (sometimes called the Psalms, because that was the biggest book there). We’ll come back to those sections in a minute. But when it was translated into Greek, into what’s called the Septuagint, they moved from three categories to 5 – Law, History, Poetry, Major Prophets, and Minor Prophets. From my digging, I can’t figure out why. But they did.
But all that to say, the Bible Jesus used – the Hebrew Bible – begins with Genesis and ends not with Malachi but with 2 Chronicles.
So when Jesus comes in Luke 11, talking about persecution, He says,[8]
Luke 11:49–51
Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation.
Trivia time: Who was chronologically the first martyr in the Bible?
Able
And the last martyred prophet in the Old Testament?
Uriah, son of Shemaiah, in Jeremiah 26:20-23.
But Jesus speaks of the span of martyred prophets from Abel to Zechariah – who was stoned about 200 years before Uriah was killed.
So why does Jesus say Able to Zechariah? (And don’t guess he wanted it to be A through Z… The Bible wasn’t written in English).
Because you read about Zechariah’s death in 2 Chronicles 24:20-21, meaning, as Jesus read His bible, and the Pharisees theirs, the last martyr they read about in the bible is Zechariah.
And so, Jesus is implicitly stating the Old Testament is the complete revelation of God. He goes from first to last. They have the books they should have. And it testifies the information they should know.
And more than that, scripture affirms those books of the Old Testament as scripture. That is, it thinks of itself as the Bible, not just a random collection of writings. We see this in Luke 24:27, or later in verses 44 and 45. I’ll cite these later ones.
Luke 24:44–45 - Then [Jesus] said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures…
So Jesus calls the sections of the Old Testament the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms. And then Luke jumps in to summarize what happened – Jesus opened their minds to understand the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms? Well, he calls that the Scriptures. Luke affirms that when Jesus talks about the Old Testament, He’s talking about scripture. It’s not just a random collection of traditional writings, but the Bible affirms the Bible as Bible.
And yes, that sounds really circular, and it is somewhat, but – as Mark Thompson correctly points out,
…The nature of the Bible as we have it needs to be taken into account. While we rightly speak of the Bible as a single work with an overarching narrative, a central figure, and a single primary author, it is at the same time a collection of writings from different human authors written over an extended period. Close examination also reveals a variety of genres (law, proverb, poetry, prophecy, epistle, and apocalyptic vision, as well as historical narrative), highlighting those multiple voices and perspectives that make up the whole. There is a texture and depth to the Bible, which raises questions about any suggestion that its self-testimony is viciously circular. An appeal to the Bible is in fact an appeal to the promises recorded in Genesis, played out in the history of Israel recorded centuries later, alluded to and reaffirmed by the prophets writing later still, with the poetic voice of David and the wise sayings of Solomon brought alongside at appropriate moments. It is an appeal to the New Testament fulfillment of that Old Testament promise and anticipation in the record of the life and ministry of Jesus, his words (and in some cases those of his opponents), and the words of his commissioned missionaries and spokesmen.[9]
That’s simply astounding. Maybe you’ve seen this before – this is a chart of where the Bible alludes to or quotes itself – the harmony of cross refences in the Bible. The guy that made this chart found upwards of 60,000 of them:[10]
Apostolic Origin
So the second big category that undergirds the Bible’s trustworthiness is its apostolic origin. And, obviously this is a New Testament category – the Old Testament wasn’t written by Apostles, but we already somewhat established a minute ago that it was considered to be divine scripture.
And when we consider Apostolic Origin, we’re getting at the truth that the apostles had this foundational role of “ministers of the new covenant” (2 Cor 3:6). As such, their letters were inherently authoritative. They were commissioned by God – through Christ. And so, these letters weren’t later given a status they didn’t have by being made scripture, but rather, what they already were was recognized officially. “They are not regarded as canon because the church receives them; the church receives them because they are already canon by virtue of their apostolic authority.”[11]
Or, to say it this way – when Paul’s pen hit the paper, it was scripture by virtue of his being an apostle. And it seems the Apostles understood this. Let me give a few examples.[12]
Mark 1:1 reads, “The Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God.”
“Gospel” was not a literary term – a theological biography – as we would think of the Gospel of Mark. Rather, it referred at that time to authoritative preaching. That’s what Mark thought he was doing – bringing a message with the authority of the apostles – and though he himself wasn’t an apostle, he closely worked with Peter on it.
If you’re curious about his partnership with Peter, it’s fun to note who the first disciple mentioned and the last disciple mentioned are in the book of Mark. It’s a little clue of where the information came from.
John 21:24 reads, “This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things, and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true.” It explains that John is the beloved apostle. And He’s writing this book. Apostolic origin.
And in 20:31 he gives his purpose.
[30] Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; [31] but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
Its interesting that when John, in that very book, introduces Old Testament scripture, he uses the Greek “Grapho”, it is written, which now he’s using that same word to refer to what He’s doing – he has written these things. There’s an authoritative message from God being written – in the Old Testament, and in this gospel of John – by an authorized messenger – so you may believe. So that you may know God – isn’t that the entire point of the doctrine of revelation?
Paul – 1 Corinthains 14:37 – He didn’t think he was writing haphazardly, but equated his own authority with Jesus’ authority. “If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord.”
A very obvious example is 2 Peter 3:16 where Peter call’s Paul’s letters scripture:
[15] And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, [16] as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.
But here’s where we land after this. This is N. T. Wright:
“It used to be said that the New Testament writers “Didn’t think they were writing ‘Scripture.’” That is hard to sustain historically today. The fact that their writings were, in various senses, “occasional” . . .is not to the point. At precisely those points of urgent need (when, for instance, writing Galatians or 2 Corinthians) Paul is most conscious that he is writing as one authorized, by the apostolic call he had received from Jesus Christ, and in the power of the Spirit, to bring life and order to the church by his words.[13]
It’s not like these guys just starting writing letters (or a Substack!) to encourage or teach or correct – and then later people put these forward saying “This should be bible!” No, from the moment pen hit paper, the authors knew they were writing authoritatively on behalf of God. And thus, given the New Testament has apostolic origins, it undergirds its trustworthiness.
Now, the last category we want to consider is
Corporate Reception
And I think this is maybe one of the more misunderstood categories. It doesn’t mean that under emperor Constantine at the Council of Nicaea (325AD) the church – well, the powerful white men in the church came together and decided what the Bible should be. What books would keep them in power and keep the oppressed oppressed. I think that’s how the story goes.
I mean, sure, if you give that story to any secular, god-hating, anti-religious historian and they’ll laugh you out of the building. Because Nicaea had nothing to do with the cannon.
Funny enough, that idea comes from The DaVinci Code in 2003.[14] And as much as I love Tom Hanks…It’s just not true. It’s an expansion on an idea he found in a 1601 translation of a Greek text from the late 9th century that should have obviously been known to be a myth (a fun rabbit trail, if you want to chase it).
But nearly a century before that idea started floating around, Calvin wrote this:
Paul testifies that the church is "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets" (Eph 2:20). If the doctrine of the apostles and prophets is the foundation of the church, the former must have had its certainty before the latter began to exist. . . . Nothing, therefore can be more absurd than the fiction, that the power of judging Scripture is in the church, and that on her nod its certainty depends. When the church receives it, and gives it the stamp of her authority, she does not make that authentic which was otherwise doubtful or controverted but, acknowledging it as the truth of God, she, as in duty bound, shows her reverence by an unhesitating assent.[15]
So, this is really an extension of point 1 – the self-revealing glory of God through scripture. Kruger asks, If scripture testifies to individuals that it is the Word of God, shouldn’t we expect it to testify to corporate bodies as well? Shouldn’t the agreement of individuals have some weight to it?[16]
If Christians saw this as from God, shouldn’t they agree that it’s the Bible? That’s what corporate reception means. And I don’t have time to get into the history of the formation of canon and all the early conversations.
Though, if you want to go down that trail, I can guarantee that it will strengthen your faith, not harm it. So feel free to read FF Bruce or Timothy Paul Jones on your own if you want to. Or Michael Kruger.
Let me give you the bottom line here. Every single branch of the Christian Church recognizes the New Testament as-is. There’s no dispute over extra books – like the Apocrypha – like there is with the Old Testament. And there was never a church council convened to discuss what should be the New Testament. The cannon came together, and stuck together, throughout all of church history – and is still universally agreed on today.[17]
Whenever a diverse group of people agree, especially the church, that should give us a great deal of confidence in our bibles.
So, at the end of the day, I think the place to end is with John 10:27. Why do we trust the Bible? Because Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.” We hear God’s voice in the Bible, and follow Him.
Why trust the Bible? I love what Wayne Grudem says,
Our confidence is based on the faithfulness of God. We know that God loves His people and it is supremely important that God's people have His own words, for they are our life (Deuteronomy 32:47, Matthew 4:4).[18]
Conclusion: The Sight of Glory
Remember what Edwards said? “The mind ascends to the truth of the gospel but by one step, and that is its divine glory.”[19]
God – or the Bible - never expects you to have faith by leaping into the dark. He assumes that we embrace Christ and his Scripture by seeing real and compelling grounds for trust.[20]
When we come to faith, it’s not just a jump into the dark, hoping something catches us. Rather, there’s a reality of glory that we’re responding to. Faith isn’t like a blind date – rather, it’s getting to know the girl (or guy), seeing how beautiful their character – and even how beautiful their looks are – and being irresistibly drawn towards wanting to marry them.
Faith isn’t blind trust, it’s informed desire. And with it, though your sight of God’s glory in scripture – and the confirmation of the church’s sight of it as well – we should have assurance of God’s trustworthiness through the Bible.
It’s like when Isaiah shows up in God’s heavenly throne room (Isa 6) and sees His majesty, perfection, beauty, and excellency, he doesn’t ask for proof that this is God. He experiences firsthand the beauty and believes.
It’s the same with experiencing God through His word.[21]
[1] John M. Frame, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Christian Belief (Phillipsburg, New Jersey: P&R Publishing, 2013), 545.
[2] John Piper, A Peculiar Glory: How the Christian Scriptures Reveal Their Complete Truthfulness (Wheaton: Crossway, 2016), 14.
[3] Piper, 157.
[4] Michael J. Kruger, Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books (Wheaton, Ill: Crossway, 2012).
[5] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Beveridge, Henry (Peabody, Mass: Hendrickson Publishers, 2008), sec. 7.2.
[6] Paul Helm, cited in Kruger, Canon Revisited, 130.
[7] Paul David Tripp, Do You Believe? 12 Historic Doctrines to Change Your Everyday Life (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2021), chap. 2.
[8] Piper, A Peculiar Glory, 47–48.
[9] Mark Thompson, The Doctrine of Scripture: An Introduction, Short Studies in Systematic Theology (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2022), 26.
[10] “Chris Harrison | BibleViz,” accessed December 28, 2023, https://www.chrisharrison.net/index.php/visualizations/BibleViz.
[11] Kruger, Canon Revisited, 161.
[12] All from Kruger, 185–89.
[13] Kruger, 189.
[14] John D. Meade, “No, Nicaea Didn’t Create the Canon,” The Gospel Coalition, August 24, 2020, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/nicaea-canon/.
[15] Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, sec. 7.2.
[16] Kruger, Canon Revisited, 105.
[17] Gerald Lewis Bray, God Is Love: A Biblical and Systematic Theology (Wheaton, Ill: Crossway, 2012), 52.
[18] Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Leicester, England : Grand Rapids, Mich: Inter-Varsity Press ; Zondervan Pub. House, 1994), 65.
[19] Piper, A Peculiar Glory, 138.
[20] Piper, 133.
[21] Kruger, Canon Revisited, 127.
you do realize at the time of Jesus the apocryphal books were considered apart of the OT canon at least according to the septuagint. so why do you reject them? because they support catholic dogma and refute protestant teaching? because martin luther said so, or st jerome had doubts about whether they belonged in scripture? scripture doesnt tell us, so all of your argumentation falls flat. only the church can say. and this is exactly what hte bible itself says and shows. 1 tim 3:15 the church is the pillar and ground of truth. not the bible.