My Sheep Hear My Voice: An Argument for the Bible as Necessary Basic Belief, Part 6

How does man's rejection of the Bible as the Word of God inscripturated parallel his failure to recognize Jesus as the Word of God incarnated? For one, it is not to the detriment of either the Bible or Jesus.

Just as the Bible possesses divine-human authorship, Jesus likewise possesses all necessary divine and human attributes in order to truly be considered fully God and fully man. Thus, as the Bible carries with it certain qualities inherent to it being God's Word, Jesus' words and works carry with them their own intrinsic qualities that bear witness to him as the Messiah and Son of God.

In this concluding post, we will briefly seek to restate why the sheep are able to hear the voice of their Shepherd in the Scripture.

What's more, we will show that in order for either the Bible or Jesus to be savingly believed upon, a person must be given both moral and epistemic deliverance by way of regeneration.

Perhaps there is no more appropriate passage than John 10 to summarize the position that has been argued for in this series of posts. In the setting of this passage, Jesus is in the midst of another confrontation with the Pharisees who are demanding to be told plainly whether or not he is the Christ (John 10:24).

Jesus does not respond by performing miracles or by providing further evidences. He understands that by his divine nature his words come with self-attesting authority.[1] Instead, Jesus tells the Pharisees why they do not believe his words and others do: “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not part of my flock” (John 10:25-26).

The reason the Pharisees do not accept Jesus or his words is not because of any deficiency in him or his works, but because they have not been enabled to respond as Jesus’ followers have been. “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me,” Jesus explains (10:27). Like all unbelievers, the Pharisees have not been given the moral and epistemic deliverance necessary for them to believe.

As mentioned in part one, looking back upon my response as a young Christian to the question, “How do we know the Bible is God’s Word?,” I believe that my answer described at the outset holds just as true today. As those with renewed hearts and restored minds, Christians can recognize the voice of their Creator speaking to them as they read the pages of Scripture.

Moreover, apart from God’s Word, no one can truly make sense of anything. God’s revelation of himself is the ultimate basic belief, making any and all ensuing knowledge possible. I am as much now as I was several years ago a sheep simply hearing the voice of his Shepherd.

This article is the sixth and final in a series of posts modified from a research paper submitted by Joshua M. Hayes to The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Spring 2009. Parts one, two, three, four, and five can be found by clicking the corresponding links.
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Footnotes:

[1]Greg L. Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetic: Readings and Analysis (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1998), 201. Bahnsen writes, “When Christ speaks, the very words themselves carry the justifying evidence that they are God’s, which is obvious to men and is acknowledged by God’s people.”

My Sheep Hear My Voice: An Argument for the Bible as Necessary Basic Belief, Part 1

How do we know the Bible is God’s Word? I recall posing this question to a brother-in-Christ during my initial months as a believer. At the time, he and I were regularly involved with one-to-one street evangelism, and in this present skeptic age, the question would often come up. In trying to establish an adequate response, I quipped, “How do we know? You can tell by reading it.”

I would like to think that since then my theology and apologetics have become somewhat more sophisticated. However, in my several years of studying, conversing, and thinking about the best answer to the question, I have discovered that I was more on-target than I had first realized despite being young in Christ. The Bible does indeed provide sufficient witness in itself to be recognized as God’s Word. In more lucid terms, we know the Bible is the Word of God because we recognize it as God’s revelation to us on its own terms and on its own claims.

Before looking directly at the Bible’s own claim to divine authority, we will discuss the two major positions concerning how to make the case for the Bible. In other words, how do we argue that it is indeed the inspired, authoritative Word of God? Theologians and apologists representing orthodox, evangelical Christianity are somewhat divided over the issue of methodology. For the purposes of this discussion, we will assess the classical and presuppositional approaches.

In this post, I will provide an analysis of the classical approach in making the case for Scripture, an approach that although adopted by many respected evangelical scholars, I perceive to be erring both in terms of its methodology and in its epistemic prioritization.

Philosopher and apologist William Lane Craig serves as an appropriate example for the first of the two views we will discuss, that of classical apologetics. In answering the question, “How do I know that Christianity is true?,” Craig states it is helpful to distinguish between knowing and showing. “We know Christianity is true primarily by the self-authenticating witness of God’s Spirit,” he writes. “We show Christianity is true by presenting good arguments for its central tenets.”[1] According to Craig, certain truths of Christianity are known by those who come under the influence and conviction of the Holy Spirit. The believer can be said to know the “great truths of the Gospel” apart from supplementary evidence.[2]

Knowing gives way to showing when the Christian comes into contact with an adherent of another religion or worldview who claims to have a self-authenticating experience. Craig acknowledges that such a claim does not undermine the truthfulness of Christianity, but it does force the Christian apologist to appeal to outside proof in order to remain noncircular in his argumentation.[3] Craig shares in common with other apologists a methodology that seeks to establish neutral criteria by which to evaluate worldviews and validate the truthfulness of the Christian faith.[4]

Accordingly, classical apologetics has traditionally sought to first prove God’s existence with the various theistic proofs and then appeal to isolated evidences in order to demonstrate the veracity of Christian theism. As R.C. Sproul notes, the apologist first seeks to prove the existence of God and follows suit by arguing for the authority of the Bible.[5] However, the case for the Bible’s divine authority is not established until the case has been made for the possibility of miracles, the historical reliability of Scripture, and the deity of Christ, which consequently confirms his testimony concerning the Bible.[6] With the classical approach, one can know with certainty that Christianity is true, but one can only show it with probability.

But if one can make a probable case for Christianity, does not the unbeliever remain somewhat intellectually justified in his refusal to submit to the Bible as the Word of God? After all, the Bible could still possibly turn out not to be God's authoritative revelation to mankind once more evidence becomes available. In our next post, we will seek to demonstrate why the presuppositional approach is necessary to make an adequate case for the certainty of the Bible as God's inspired and inerrant Word, both in terms of knowability and argumentation.

This article is the first in a series of posts modified from a research paper submitted by Joshua M. Hayes to The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Spring 2009.
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Footnotes:

[1]William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics, 3rd ed. (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008), 43-60.

[2]Ibid., 43-44. Craig lists such beliefs as “God exists,” “I am condemned by God,” “I am reconciled to God,” and “Christ lives in me” as implied by the work of the Holy Spirit upon a person, bringing not just subjective assurance but objective knowledge.

[3]Ibid., 51-52, 57. Craig later makes clear our common ground with unbelievers is “the laws of logic and the facts of experience.” For Craig, this is where apologetics begins, whereas the earlier discussion pertaining to Christian epistemology serves only as an “in-house discussion.” This implies that rather than to show the unbeliever to have the incorrect epistemology, we should seek to prove the Christian faith on grounds that will appease the unbeliever’s view of rationality.

[4]See for example Ronald H. Nash, Faith & Reason: Searching for a Rational Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1988), 51-59.

[5]R.C. Sproul, Defending Your Faith: An Introduction to Apologetics (Wheaton: Crossway, 2003), 19.

[6]For an overview of such block-house methodology, see Norman Geisler, Christian Apologetics (Peabody: Prince Press, 2003), 263-377. Geisler gives the outline of the main premises involved in classical argumentation, 264-65.