THE NORTHERN KENTUCKY SEARCHER
"Search the scriptures: for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. " (John 5:39)

VOLUME 3, NUMBER 40, NOVEMBER 2, 2003

REVELATION AND INSPIRATION

             In Isaiah 11, a truly beautiful passage that prophesied of the coming Messiah and the nature of His kingdom, verses 8 – 9 tell us, “And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den.  They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”   It is God’s purpose to reveal Himself to us.  We will never have a complete knowledge of God, but we can most assuredly have a true knowledge of those aspects of Him that He chooses to reveal.

            Revelation is a fact, and through it, God makes Himself, His truth, and His will known to man.  He does it in several ways that can fit into two main categories.  There is general revelation and there is special revelation.    General revelation is called “general” because it provides just a general knowledge of God.  It is available through creation.  Consider Paul’s words in Romans 1:19-20, where he argued that even pagans must answer to the true God because of what they could know of Him.  He wrote, “Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them: for God hath showed it unto them.  For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.”

            I believe that in addition to the general revelation in creation, there is also an element of it in each human being by virtue of the fact that we are all created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26).   In Romans 2:14-16, we find, “For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;) in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.”  Paul is teaching that instilled in man is the instinctive knowledge that certain acts are right and certain acts are wrong.  This can be identified as the basic moral law of God.

            In addition to “general revelation” there is “special revelation.”  This type of revelation gives us knowledge about God and His will for man that is much more specific than general revelation can be.  Hebrews 1:1-3 addresses this type of revelation.  The passage says, “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.”  There are different kinds of special revelation, but for our purpose we are focusing on the special revelation whereby God revealed Himself in words. 

            The fact that God has revealed aspects of Himself in words is clearly taught in scripture.  He spoke to Adam and Eve, to Noah, Abraham, Moses, Samuel, and to many other prophets.    How many times in the Old Testament do we read, “Thus says the Lord?”  David said in 2 Samuel 23:2, “The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue.”  We already saw in Hebrews 1, that “God hath spoken…”  Now, revelation in words may be written down and that doesn’t change its nature as revelation.  But it does bring up a question.

            How do we know that what is written is accurate?  We can be sure that God can and does accurately deliver His message to the prophet, but how do we know that the prophet accurately delivers the message to us?  This is where inspiration comes in.

            How many times will we say that the Bible is inspired of God, but what does that mean?  When God revealed a message to a prophet, and the prophet was in the process of passing that message along, either orally or in writing, God exerted a power or influence upon that individual that assured that what he said or wrote was what God wanted him to say or write.  That is called inspiration.

            Paul affirms the inspiration of the Old Testament in Romans 3:1-2, when he wrote, “What advantage then hath the Jew/ or what profit is there of circumcision?  Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.”  Or to put in another way, the “very words of God.”   In 2 Timothy 3:16-17, he wrote, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”   The literal meaning of “theopneustos” or inspiration, is “God-breathed.”  This means “breathed out” by God.

            Peter affirms inspiration in 2 Peter 1:20-21, when he wrote, “But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.”   It is important to understand that in this passage Peter is referring to how the writers of the scripture came up with what they wrote, not how individual interpret what they wrote. 

            As we close this article, the point should be made that since “all scripture is God-breathed”, than the inspiration is plenary, meaning all inclusive and complete.  In the originals everything contained therein was there by the will of God.

                                                                        Greg Litmer