The Truth About Bible Inspiration

 

Introduction:  Observation about Inspiration

 

A.    Why is inspiration so important to us?

 

1.       Many just think of the Bible as a good book of moral religious suggestions (Jn.   6:68; Jn. 12: 48; Jn. 6: 63)

 

2.      Evolution & Humanism are being taught in our schools (Gen. 1:1; Ps. 19:1; Eccl. 12:1)

 

3.      So much religious skepticism about the Bible ( Jer. 37:17; Rom. 5:4)

 

4.      If the Bible is not inspired everything we do is in vain  (1 Cor. 15: 14; Jn. 17:17; Ps. 19:7 )

 

B.     The Bible demands we prove all things (I Thes. 5:21, I Cor. 5:7, Heb. 11:1,6, saying you believe and proving are two different things—1 Pet. 3:15).

 

I.                   The Bible’s Claim to Inspiration.

 

A.     The Bible claims that it is of divine origin (2 Tim. 3:16-17, 2 Pet. 1-19-21, 1 Cor. 14:37, I Cor. 2:13, Ps. 119:160).

 

B.  What exactly does inspiration mean?

            1.  Gr. Word means God exhaled

2.      Plenary—fully and complete (2 Pet. 1:3, Jn. 16:13).

3.      Verbal—2 Sam. 23:2, I Cor. 2:13

4.      Infallible (Jn. 17:17, James 1:25)

5.      Authoratative—Jn. 12:48, I Cor. 14:37

 

II.                 The Uniqueness of the Bible.

 

A.     The Bible is the most unique book ever made.

1.      It contains 66 books.

2.      It was written by 40 writers

3.      It took 1500 years to complete it.

4.      Many of the writers were from different countries.

5.      They spoke different languages.

6.      They were of different trades.

7.      But all of them said the exact same thing!!

 

B.     This uniqueness should help us to see the Bible is from God

III.              Proofs of Bible Inspirations.

A.     Prophecy as Proof of inspiration. 

1.      Prophecy is defined as the predicting of future events with such exacting accuracy and minute detail that it must come from God.  Unlike fortune tellers, astrologers, palm readers, and psychics.

2.      Some examples of Prophecy are:

a.      Jer. 25:9-12, 29:10-12—70 years, Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar.

b.      Virgin Birth Isa. 7:14—Matt. 1:20-21—750 years before, never happened before.

c.      The Cross—Ps. 22—1000 years before—exact in every way.

d.      Jerusalem—Matt. 24,

e.      Betheleham—Micah 5:2

 

B.     Scientific Foreknowledge as  a proof of Bible Inspiration.

 

1. Herbert Spencer’s 5 Manifestations (1820)

             

a.   “Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) first announced that there are only five ‘manifestations of the unknowable’ in existence—time, force, action, space, and matter—and that all else is based on these fundamentals.  This was hailed as a great announcement but when God had that great Scientists, Moses, write the very first verse in the Bible, He said, ‘Moses, 3400 years from now men will think they  have discovered everything so you just put it all in Genesis 1:1 and we will begin with everything man can discover’” (Dehoff, pg. 47).

 

b.      Notice how these same principles that Herbert Spencer discovered are found in Genesis 1:1 “In the Beginning—Time, God—Force, created—action, the heavens—space, and the earth—matter.”  Isn’t it wonderful to know that our God has known these all alone and revealed them to us thousands of years before they were discovered?  In fact, it is very amazing that these same five principles are in the exact same order in Genesis 1:1 that Spencer announced them in.

 

     2.  The Moon a Witness (Ps. 89:37)

 

            a.  In this passage, God refers to the seed of David as being like the moon in faithfulness.  But, it is interesting that the Psalmists would refer to the moon as a witness.  Why a witness?  What does a witness do?  Does he not testify of something that he has seen or heard?  Likewise, the moon is a witness of the Sun’s light on earth.  The moon itself contains no natural light source.  The light that the moon gives off is a reflection (witness) of the Sun’s light. 

 

            b.  How was the Psalmist able to know that the moon was only a witness of the Sun’s light?  Did he have a telescope?  Did he have the scientific knowledge to discover that?  Not hardly!  The only way he could have known this is if God told him.

 

 

 

 

     3. The Earth’s Suspension (Job 26:7)

 

            a.  “The writers of the Bible simply do not make the scientific blunders that their contemporaries make.  In Job 26:7, how did Job know that God suspended the earth upon nothing?  Men throughout antiquity thought that the earth was held up by Atlas, or perhaps by four elephants standing on a giant turtle” (Miller, pg. 442).

 

            b.  While not all men in the ancient world believed some of the far-fetched views about how the world was held up, many did.  As Dehoff notes, “The ancient Greeks and Romans were the most advanced peoples in their time, yet they believed that the earth was held in place by poles or by the neck of Atlas.  Others believed that Atlas had the earth on his shoulders.  Some said that the earth floated on water and should one go too far out on the sea he would surely perish” (Dehoff, pg. 50).

 

4. The Rotundity of the Earth (Isa. 40:22, Luke 17:31, 34).

 

 

            a.  “It has been only a few centuries since the scientists and teachers all believed in a flat earth, and those intellectuals may well have thought the Bible was unscientific when it described a spherical earth… The word translated ‘circle’ is the Hebrew kuhg, a more exact connotation of which is ‘sphericity’ or ‘roundness’.  It is also used in Proverbs 8:27: ‘He sets a compass upon the face of the depth [or ‘deep’].’  The same word is here translated ‘compass,’ referring to the surface of the ocean taking on a spherical shape…” (Morris, pg. 13-14).

 

b.      “When the bible was written it was universally believed that the earth was flat.  It was argued that should one go too far toward the edge he would fall off.  The early Grecians as well as Toscanelli, an Italian, suggested the rotundity of the earth.  Columbus and others believed them.  Finally, Magellan and his men sailed around the earth and thus proved it to be spherical in shape” (Dehoff, pg. 49).  This major event did not occur until the 15th century.

 

 

5. Path in the Sea (Ps. 8:8).

 

            a.  One of the greatest finds in this century has to do with Oceanography.  A man by the name of Matthew Fontaine Murray discovered the sailing paths in the sea.  About this Dehoff writes “Before Matthew Fontaine Murray lived there were no sailing lanes and no charts of the sea.  One day, when he was ill, his son read to him from the eighth Psalm.  He read that God put under man ‘…the fowls of the air, the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passes through the paths of the sea.’  ‘Read that again’, he said.  Upon hearing it the second time, the venerable scientists said, ‘If the Word of God says there are paths in the sea, they must be there.  I will find them.’” (Dehoff, pg. 53).

             

b.      Today, Mr. Murray is known as the Father of Oceanography.  He founded the Annapolis Academy.  Also, in Richmond, Virginia there is a statue of Mr. Murray with a Bible in one hand and the charts of the sea in the other.

 

IV.               The Application of Inspiration.

 

A.  Live it

 

 

B.  Love it

 

 

C.  Let others know about it.