Chapter 1 Part 4-5 The Authority of Scripture
OUTLINE The witness of God The witness of evidences The witness of the Spirit INTRODUCTION By what authority do we accept the Bible to be the word of God? This is the question that the 1689 is addressing in Ch. 1 para. 4-5. This may sound like a strange question to you but it is an important one. At the time of the Reformation a major part of the disagreement between the Protestants and the Catholics was over authority. The Reformers were saying that the Scripture alone is our authority as it is the Word of God; the Catholic...
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Christian Ethics: Cannabis & Euthanasia
Thanks to Joe Fleener from Rolleston Baptist Church for speaking to us this afternoon from Luke 10:25-37, on how we make ethical decisions as Christians. 25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.”...
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The Bible: Part 6: Manuscripts of the Bible
Introduction: Several years ago now I had an email exchange with a Muslim in Saudi Arabia. It ended badly with him phoning me from Saudi and swearing at me for blasphemy and wishing cancer on me and my family. But during the exchange it was very interesting to see the ways in which he tried to disprove Christianity, he attacked the manuscript reliability of the NT, and put a question mark over the Canon of the Bible. It amazed me to see how intimate his knowledge was of the early transmission of the various manuscripts and his familiarity with...
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The Bible: Part 3: Unity
Introduction: Marcion was one of the early heretics in Church history. He thought that the God of the OT was different to the God of the NT. He saw the God of the OT as one of law and anger, but the God of the NT as one of love and grace. He took a pair of scissors to the Bible and came up with a Bible that only had a butchered copy of Luke’s gospel and 10 of Paul’s letters. He could not see the unity of the OT with the NT, he could not see the compatibility...
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The Bible: Part 2: Uniqueness
Introduction: One of the greatest arguments for Christianity is the Bible itself. There is no other book like the Bible. Immanuel Kant who for the most part rejected Christianity said this of the Bible, ‘The existence of the Bible, as a book for the people, is the greatest benefit which the human race has ever experienced. Every attempt to belittle it is a crime against humanity.’ The Bible has fallen upon hard times and is seen as refuted, as a set of myths, as a collection of politically motivated books to suit the governing power, as merely a record...
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The Bible: Part 1: Authority
Introduction: We are continuing to put forward positive reasons for faith, and today we start a mini-series looking at the bible as a ground for believing. The 1689 chapter 1 paragraph 5 reads, ‘We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the church of God to a high and reverent esteem of the Holy Scriptures; and the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, and the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole (which is to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of...
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