The Bible: The Written Word of God
The best way to understand who God is and what he is like is through Jesus, who is called the Word of God who became a human (John 14:8-11).
How do we learn about Jesus and what he is like? We learn through the Bible, which is the written word of God. It is important for us to know what the Bible says and what it is about.
Well preserved
To understand the Bible, we need to know what kind of book it is. It is a collection of many different books written in various styles at different times. They were written a long time ago in cultures that are very different from ours today.
Some educated people do not believe in the accuracy or authority of the Bible. However, many other educated people think it is a trustworthy record of what God has done and said. Some people believe only the parts of the Bible they like, but this says more about them than it does about Jesus.
Do we have good reason to trust the biblical reports about Jesus? Yes! The Bible was written only a few decades after Jesus died, when people who saw him were still alive. Jewish followers often memorized what their teachers said, so it makes sense that Jesus’ followers remembered his teachings correctly. There is no evidence that the writers of the four Gospels made up sayings to answer questions in the early church about things like circumcision. This means that these books are like to be reliable reports of what Jesus taught.
Jesus’ witness to Scripture
Jesus was willing to argue with the Pharisees on many issues, but he did not argue with their view of the Scriptures. Although Jesus sometimes had a different understanding of the meaning, he apparently agreed with other Jewish leaders that the Scriptures had authority to tell us what to believe and what to do.
Jesus expected every word in the Scriptures to come true (Matthew 5:17-18; Mark 14:49). He quoted biblical verses to support his points (Matthew 9:13; 22:31; 26:24; 26:31; John 10:34). He also told people they needed to read the Scriptures more carefully (Matthew 22:29; Luke 24:25; John 5:39). He talked about Old Testament people and events as if they were real.
Scripture had the authority of God behind it. When Jesus answered Satan’s temptations, he said, “It is written…” (Matthew 4:4-10). When something was in Scripture, it was a strong authority. The words of David were inspired by the Holy Spirit (Mark 12:36); a prophecy was given “through” Daniel (Matthew 24:15, NASB) because its real source was God.
Jesus said that the Creator said: “A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife” (Matthew 19:4-5, quoting Genesis 2:24). Genesis does not say this verse was spoken by God, but Jesus could say that God said it because it was in Scripture. He believed that God is the real author of Scripture, the One who was behind or working in all the human authors.
The evidence throughout the Gospels is that Jesus viewed Scripture as reliable and trustworthy. He reminded the Jewish leaders, “Scripture cannot be annulled” (John 10:35). Jesus expected it to be true; he supported old covenant commands while the old covenant was still in effect (Matthew 8:4; 23:23).
Witness of the apostles
The apostles, like their teacher, believed that the Bible was true and had authority. They often quoted it to support their arguments. The words in the Bible are seen as coming from God.
- Scripture is even personalized as God speaking to people like Abraham and Pharaoh (Romans 9:17; Galatians 3:8).
- What David, Isaiah, or Jeremiah wrote was really from God, so it is true (Acts 1:16; 4:25; 13:35; 28:25; Hebrews 1:6-10; 10:15).
- The law of Moses is used to show what God thinks (1 Corinthians 9:9).
- The true author of the Bible is God (1 Corinthians 6:16; Romans 9:25).
Paul called the Scriptures “the oracles [or sayings] of God” (Romans 3:2). Peter said that the prophets “moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (2 Peter 1:20-21). The prophets didn’t just make things up – God inspired them, and he is the real source of their words. The Old Testament prophets often wrote, “the word of the Lord came to me…” or “This is what the Lord says…”
Paul also told Timothy, “All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). God gave a message to the writers, and he gave it for a special purpose: for salvation (verse 15) and to teach us how to live (verse 16).
However, we should not think that “inspired” means that God told them every single word to write. Paul talked about the Scriptures that Timothy had known since he was a child (verse 15). This would have been the Greek translation, which is different in some places from the original Hebrew.
Paul used the Greek translation as the inspired word of God, even though it was not a perfect text. Even with its differences, it is still God-breathed and can help people become “wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” and it can still prepare believers “for every good work” (verse 17).
Imperfect communication
The original word of God is perfect, and God is able to cause people to state it accurately, to preserve it accurately and (to complete the communication) cause us to understand it correctly. But God has not done all this. Our copies have grammatical errors, copyist errors, and (far more significantly) humans always make errors in receiving the message. There is “noise” that prevents us from hearing perfectly the message that God inspired to be written in Scripture. Nevertheless, God uses Scripture to speak to us today.
Despite the “noise” that puts human mistakes between God and us, the purpose of Scripture is accomplished: to tell us about salvation and about right behavior. God accomplishes his purpose in Scripture: he communicates his word to us with enough clarity that we can be saved and we can learn what he wants us to do.
Scripture, even in a translation, is accurate for its purpose. But we would be wrong to expect more from it than God intended. He is not teaching us astronomy or science. The numbers in Scripture are not always mathematically precise by today’s standards. We must look at Scripture for its purpose, not for minor details.
For example, in Acts 21:11, Agabus was inspired to say that the Jews would bind Paul and hand him over to the Gentiles. Some people might assume that Agabus was specifying who would tie Paul up, and what they would do with him. But as it turns out, Paul was actually rescued by the Gentiles and bound by the Gentiles (21:30-33).
Is this a contradiction? Technically, yes. The prediction was true in principle, but not in the details. When Luke wrote this, he could have easily doctored the prediction to fit the result, but he was willing to let the differences be seen. He did not think that people should expect precision in such details. This should warn us about expecting precision in all the details of Scripture.
We need to focus on the main point of the message. Similarly, Paul made a mistake when he wrote 1 Corinthians 1:14– a mistake he corrected in verse 16. The inspired Scriptures contain both the mistake and the correction.
We accept the history of the church, which shows that Christians over the years have found the Bible helpful for their faith and actions. If God went to the trouble of becoming a human and dying for our sins, to reveal himself to us, we would expect that he would also lead his people to have a reliable record of what he did in Jesus. This book tells us who Jesus is, what he did for us, and how we should respond.
Tradition also tells us which books are in the Bible. We believe that God guided the process so that the final result serves his purpose. This cannot be proven, but it is based on our understanding of what God is doing with us.
No one can prove that all of the Bible is true. They may show that a particular prophecy came true, but they cannot show that the entire Bible has the same validity. This is based more on faith. We see the historical evidence that Jesus and the apostles accepted the Old Testament as the word of God. The biblical Jesus is the only one we have; other ideas are based on guesswork, not new evidence. We accept the teaching of Jesus that the Holy Spirit would guide the disciples into more truth. We accept the claim of Paul that he wrote with divine authority. We accept that the Bible reveals to us who God is and how we may have fellowship with him.
An honest book
Our experiences give us reasons to believe that Scripture is true. This book tells us about our own tendency to do selfish things, and it also tells us about God’s mercy. The Bible gives us courage to do what is right in an unexpected way – through the horrible death of our Creator.
The Bible tells us about the love, joy, and peace we can have through faith – feelings that are beyond our ability to put into words (Ephesians 3:19; 1 Peter 1:8; Philippians 4:7). This book gives us meaning and purpose in life. These aspects of biblical authority cannot be proven to skeptics, but they help support the Scriptures that tell us about these things that we experience.
The Bible does not hide the flaws of its heroes, and this also helps us see it as honest. It tells us about the serious mistakes of Abraham, Moses, David, the nation of Israel, and the disciples. The Bible tells us about the Word made flesh (Jesus) and the good news of God’s love for us.
The Bible is not simplistic. The New Testament says that it is a continuation of the old covenant and also a very new version of God’s promises. It would be easier to get rid of one part of the Bible, but it is more challenging to have both. Similarly, Jesus is shown as both human and divine, a combination that does not fit well into ancient or modern thought.
The Bible is a challenging book; it is not likely to be the result of fishermen making up stories or trying to make sense of strange dreams. The evidence for Jesus’ resurrection gives more support for the book that announces such an amazing event. It adds weight to what the disciples say about who Jesus is and to the surprising idea of conquering death through the death of Jesus.
Repeatedly, the Bible challenges our thinking about God, ourselves, life, right and wrong. We respect it because it gives us truths we do not get anywhere else. The proof of the Bible comes when we live according to what it says, as the Holy Spirit uses it to change our hearts and lives.
The testimony of Scripture, tradition, personal experience, and reason all support the authority of the Bible. It can speak to new cultures and situations that did not exist when it was written; this is also evidence that it still has authority.
Inerrancy and infallibility
Some Christians believe that we should call the Bible inerrant, meaning it has no errors; others prefer to call the Bible infallible, meaning it cannot fail. Although in normal English these words mean almost the same thing, in Christian theology they are used for different ideas.
Inerrant generally means without error in theology, history, or science. Infallible (sometimes called limited inerrancy) refers to doctrine; it does not insist on scientific and historical accuracy since those are outside of the Bible’s purpose. Grace Communion International uses the word infallible. If you find something that looks like an error, you do not need to reject the whole book. Indeed, after further study you might find out that you were the one who made the mistake! The Bible is infallible in its purpose of teaching about salvation and how we should respond to God.
John Stott, who accepts inerrancy, lists “five reasons why the word inerrancy makes me uncomfortable”:
First, God’s self-revelation in Scripture is so rich—both in content and in form—that it cannot be reduced to a string of propositions which invite the label ‘truth’ or ‘error.’ ‘True or false?’ would be an inappropriate question to address to a great deal of Scripture. [Commands and questions are neither true nor false.]
Second, the word inerrancy is a double negative, and I always prefer a single positive to a double negative. It is better to affirm that the Bible is true and therefore trustworthy….
Third, the word inerrancy sends out the wrong signals and develops the wrong attitudes. Instead of encouraging us to search the Scriptures so that we may grow in grace and in the knowledge of God, it seems to turn us into detectives hunting for incriminating clues and to make us excessively defensive in relation to apparent discrepancies.
Fourth, it is unwise and unfair to use inerrancy as a shibboleth [a test word] by which to identify who is an evangelical and who is not. The hallmark of authentic evangelicalism is not … whether we subscribe to an impeccable formula about the Bible but whether we live in practical submission to what the Bible teaches….
Fifth, it is impossible to prove that the Bible contains no errors. When faced with an apparent discrepancy, the most Christian response is neither to make a premature negative judgment nor to resort to a contrived harmonization, but rather to suspend judgment, waiting patiently for further light to be given us. (Evangelical Truth, pages 61-62)
There is another problem with the word inerrant: It must be carefully explained. Even one of the most conservative statements about Scripture admits that the Bible contains grammar mistakes, exaggerations, unclear descriptions, inexact quotes, and observations based on a limited viewpoint.[1] In other words, inerrant does not mean “without error of any kind.”
Also, inerrancy applies only to the original manuscripts, not to the copies we have today. These explanations take away much of the meaning of inerrancy. The main point, as Millard Erickson says, is that “the Bible’s assertions are fully true when judged in accordance with the purpose for which they were written.”[2]
[1] “The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy,” Article XIII, printed in Norman L. Geisler, editor, Inerrancy, Zondervan, 1979, page 496. Also in https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/themelios/article/the-chicago-statement-on-biblical-inerrancy/.
[2] Millard J. Erickson, Introducing Christian Doctrine, 3rd ed. (Baker, 2014), 204.
Author: Michael Morrison, edited in 2026
