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 5

If the Bible is so clearly the revealed Word of God and necessary to make sense of reality, as argued for in the preceding post, why do the majority of people reject it as the authority over their lives? Here, John Calvin again proves helpful:

Since for unbelieving men religion seems to stand by opinion alone, they, in order not to believe anything foolishly or lightly, both wish and demand rational proof that Moses and the prophets spoke divinely. But I reply: the testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason. For as God alone is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the Word will not find acceptance in men’s hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.[1]

Our sinful condition, Calvin says, prevents us from willfully recognizing the Bible as God’s Word. In a world free of sin, the Bible would present itself as convincing to everyone.[2] Its self-authenticating nature would be clear to all of its readers. Yet our sinful condition has left us neither willing nor able to receive the Bible as such. We need not only moral deliverance to submit to the authority of Scripture, but we also need epistemic deliverance in order to perceive it as God’s Word.

Scripture tells us that because of our sinful condition our minds are malfunctioning both morally and cognitively. Apart from saving knowledge of Christ human beings are “darkened in their understanding” (Eph 4:18) and “[do] not accept the things of the Spirit of God” (1 Cor 2:14). The unbelieving mind “does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot” (Rom 8:7). Further, Paul writes, “In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel” (2 Cor 4:4). Man’s refusal to accept God’s Word is not on account of any deficiency in the Bible itself. Instead, the fault lies in man’s refusal to acknowledge God that leaves him with a “debased mind” (Rom 1:28). Man suppresses the truth in his unrighteousness although God’s revelation of himself is always clear, both in nature and in his Word (Rom 1:18-20).[3]

It is at conversion that man’s cognitive functions are restored.[4] Repentance takes place not only in one’s actions but in one’s thinking as well.[5] No longer does the sinner’s deepest desire lie in seeking personal autonomy but in surrendering his intellectual efforts to the lordship of Christ (2 Cor 10:5). When the Holy Spirit accompanies the preaching of the gospel bringing about conversion, sinful man is able to recognize God’s Word. This transition is spoken of by Paul in 1 Thessalonians 2:13, stating that “when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God.”

It is important to note that restoration implies something being replaced that was once present, namely the human ability to hear and respond to God’s Word. In Scripture we read from the beginning that mankind has possessed this innate ability to recognize the voice of their Creator (Gen 1:28-30; 2:16-17). It was through the Fall that this ability became corrupted, which led to the further decline into sin.

However, the ability to discern God’s Word remained functional throughout redemptive history. As Greg L. Bahnsen puts it, “Men have been made to recognize [God’s] voice. . . . God has so created men that, as it were, they are ‘conditioned’ to see and understand His signature throughout the created world.”[6]

By God’s intention, human beings such as Noah and Abram were able to identify the voice of their Creator as that of the one true and living God, even in the midst of a sin-cursed world (Gen 6:13, 22; 12:1, 4). Accordingly, human reason has always been meant to be subject to God’s revelation.

It is on this basis that rather than abolishing reason, faith in God’s Word gives reason an adequate starting point. In other words, it is faith in the all-knowing God who gives meaning to every fact in the universe that allows reason to begin. It is God’s rationality that acts as the rational basis for faith; faith in turn acts as the rational basis for human reasoning.[7] Human reasoning subject to God’s Word is human reasoning as God intended.

The following words from Bahnsen might best illuminate this reality: “It should be obvious that if man, before his disabling fall into sin, needed God’s supernatural revelation to interpret his world properly, how much more do we who live under the effects of sin!”[8]

Our next post will conclude our series, "My Sheep Hear My Voice: An Argument for the Bible as Necessary Basic Belief." In part six, we shall see how man's rejection God's Word inscripturated parallels man's rejection of God's Word incarnated. In the words of Jesus, "You do not believe because you are not part of my flock" (John 10:26).

This article is the fifth 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, and four can be found by clicking the corresponding links.
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Footnotes:

[1]John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion 1.7.4, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, Library of Christian Classics, vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 2006), 79.

[2]Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), 79.

[3]Greg L. Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetic: Reading and Analysis (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1998), 211.

[4]Cornelius Van Til, Christian Apologetics, 2nd ed. (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2003), 80. He writes, “The Holy Spirit’s regenerating power enables man to place all things in true perspective.”

[5]John Frame, “Presuppositional Apologetics,” in Five Views on Apologetics, ed. Steven B. Cowan (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000), 214.

[6]Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetic, 200.

[7]Frame, “Presuppositional Apologetics,” 210.

[8]Greg L. Bahnsen, “Revelation, Speculation and Science,” Presbyterian Guardian 40 (1970-71) [on-line], accessed 25 March 2009; available from http://www.cmfnow.com, pa001.htm; Internet.

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.