In the early 1990s, I was part of a weekly Bible study group with four or five United Methodist pastors. Our group discovered that a young pastor in a nearby parish was seeking to be ordained. She had completed seminary and was writing her final theology paper which she had to present to the Board of Ordained Ministry for approval. So we invited her to come to our Bible study to share her theology paper with the group. That way we could offer our insights and suggestions as she prepared to stand before the board. We had the best of intentions and simply wanted to be supportive.
After reading the young wo-man’s paper, I was truly confused. Though it was perhaps 30 pages long, I saw scant mention of Jesus Christ. In the presence of the entire Bible study group I asked, "Where does Jesus fit into your theology?" She said, "He doesn’t." I asked, "How then is a person saved?" She said, "Anyone who believes in God is saved." I said, "Does that include Muslims, Hindus, and even idol worshipers who believe in some kind of a god?" She responded, "Yes. It looks like you have found me out." I was horrified. She had openly denied the most foundational truth of the Bible, that Jesus Christ is the only Savior. But about two months later she was ordained to the ministry on the basis of that very same theology paper. Why? I guess because she was very articulate in defense of beliefs that should have been indefensible in a Christian church.
As I have told that story, lay people are especially troubled. They assume that the Bible constitutes the standard for theology and behavior among pastors. They assume that when a young man or woman goes off to seminary, he or she will be taught to build a theology and world view on the foundation of the Scriptures. Yet in large numbers, seminary students and pastors have turned from the truth to follow gods of their own imagination. If they don’t like what the Bible says about Jesus, or hell, or sin, or any other doctrine, they simply reject it. How can they do such a thing? Quite simply, they deny the accuracy and authority of God’s Word, the Bible. I’ll always remember the time when I was speaking with another pastor about Jesus Christ. This pastor denied the deity of Jesus. When I turned to Scripture to show him why I believed in the doctrine, he said, "Don’t bother. I don’t care what the Bible says. I don’t believe it."
Sometimes people in the parish come to me and ask how things could have gone so far from truth in the church today. How can the plain truths of Scripture be so easily discarded by those who are commissioned to preach? My answer is that it actually happened very slowly. It began years ago when the authority of Scripture was challenged in a few areas. Compromise of the truth spreads like cancer. It knows no boundaries. People come to believe that if the Bible is unreliable on a few points, then it must be unreliable through and through. They incorrectly assume that the Bible erred about Jonah being swallowed by a great fish. Then, they incorrectly assume that the Bible also erred about who Jesus Christ really is. It’s like that old saying, "If you let the camel stick his nose in the tent, soon you will be sharing your tent with a camel."Does It Matter What You Believe?Some people would have us believe that there are no absolutes when it comes to truth as long as you are sincere in your beliefs. They say, You may believe the Bible, or the Muslim Koran, or personal opinions, or whatever works for you. But I believe what works for me. Such a statement is not well thought out. If, for example, one person concurs with Scripture in believing that Jesus Christ is the only Savior, and another person believes that Jesus Christ is merely one of many saviors, both cannot be right. The two positions are mutually exclusive. For one to be right, the other must be wrong. The major doctrines of Scripture are not relative. They are absolute statements that must be either right or wrong. And it matters what we believe because the Bible claims that our eternal destiny depends upon it.
Jeffrey Dahmer was a mentally troubled man who seduced young men, killed them, mutilated their corpses, ate their flesh, and even practiced necrophilia. After being found guilty of these heinous crimes, he was interviewed from prison in January 1994 by Stone Phillips of NBC news. Stone asked Jeffrey Dahmer how he could do such deeds. Dahmer said that when you don’t believe in God, there are no rules. Jeffrey Dahmer was mentally ill, but actually he made a good point. Who makes the rules? Do the rules change from person to person? And if truth is relative, then what is wrong today may be right tomorrow. Indeed, that which is wrong today may actually one day become a religious duty, if truth is relative and evolves over time. But God’s truth does not evolve. Jesus said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away." The Bible is a book of absolutes.An Infallible BookThe Bible claims to be an infallible book, meaning that it is incapable of error. Within its pages we find statements such as, "Every word of God is flawless…" (Proverbs 30:5). That means that the Bible is totally trustworthy in all that it intends to teach. But we must realize that infallibility is not the same as literalism. Just like all good literature, the Bible uses metaphor and other figures of speech that teach great truths, but were never meant to be taken literally. For example, the Bible says, "The Lord is my rock" (Psalm 18:2). He is not literally a rock in the yard, but he is powerful and strong like a rock. Jesus said: "I am the gate" (John 10:9). He is not literally a gate on hinges, but he is the only way to heaven. Such teaching is truthful but not literal. Figures of speech do not diminish the Bible’s authority.
We also use figures of speech in our modern language. I may say to my friends, "I’m going to hit the road at 8 p.m." That does not mean that I am going to pound my fist on the pavement. Virtually everyone would understand that I was planning to depart at 8 p.m. If I did indeed depart then, my words would have been truthful. When the meteorologist declares that the sun will rise at 7:01 a.m., he is not speaking a falsehood, though the sun does not literally rise—our earth rotates. In a similar way, not all parts of the Bible are intended to be taken literally. But all parts of the Bible are completely truthful and without error in all that is intended to be taught.
How do we know that the Bible is true? There are a number of solid reasons to subscribe to the view of infallibility:1. God is the author. The Bible is not a human invention but comes from God. God did give it through human channels, but Scripture declares that he was the Author behind the authors. The Bible says, "All Scripture is God-breathed" (2 Timothy 3:16). Further, the Bible says, "God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind" (Numbers 23:19).2. Fulfilled prophecy proves the Bible. The birth, life, and death of Jesus Christ were prophesied hundreds of years before they were fulfilled. A good deal of prophecy concerning the return of Jesus and the end of the age has yet to be fulfilled.3. The Bible is internally consistent. The Bible was written over a period of about 1,600 years, by about 40 different authors (from kings to fishermen), in three different languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek), on three different continents (Asia, Africa, Europe). Yet the Bible speaks with great consistency from Genesis to Revelation concerning the great doctrines of our faith.4. The Bible changes lives. God speaks to us through his Word. He uses that Word to accomplish his purposes: "[God’s Word] will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it" (Isaiah 55:11). God’s Word can transform the most hardened sinner into a compliant and repentant follower of Christ.
It is true that many pastors today do not believe in the infallibility of Scripture. But those preachers who do not trust the Bible are in effect saying, Don’t trust the Scriptures, but trust my opinions as I preach to you. In the final analysis one trusts God’s Word or the opinions of people. We either follow the God of the Bible or the god of our imaginations. In my first parish there was a new Christian named Ron. One day Ron said to me, "Pastor, if I can’t believe all of the Bible, I can’t believe any of it." I thought to myself, Here is a wise man. He has not been a Christian for long, but he is off to a really good start.The Greatest Crisis of Our DayImagine that you are an employee in a major corporation and you love your company. But suppose that your company experiences a financial loss for 30 consecutive years. Suppose that after 30 years your share of the market is reduced fully by a third, but some of your competitors are growing steadily year after year. You naturally conclude that you are in the midst of a corporate catastrophe and that you are doing something very wrong.
This analogy may be applied to the Christian denomination that I love and of which I am a part: The United Methodist Church.
In 1968, The United Methodist Church had approximately 12.5 million members. Twenty-eight years later, in 1996, we have only about 8.5 million members. While our denomination has been losing members, many other denominations, such as the Southern Baptists, have grown. Why? We United Methodists are nice people. We are inclusive of all races and classes of people, as we should be. We have been innovative in trying program after program. But we have failed in the most basic principle of all. We have failed to believe and preach the full counsel of God’s Word. God uses the Bible to change hearts and cause growth. Anything less than a high view of Scripture, the preaching of salvation through faith in Christ, and a radical obedience to all of God’s Word will keep us on our present path of decline. God says in his Word: "Those who honor me I will honor, but those who despise me will be disdained" (1 Samuel 2:30).
How important is the Bible? Is it relevant for today? Absolutely! Not only is it relevant, but the future well-being of the church and our nation rests on our collective knowledge of and compliance to God’s Word. Is that an extreme statement? Perhaps. Yet consider the promises and warnings that God attached to his Word among Old Testament Israelites: "If you fully obey the Lord your God and carefully follow all his commands…all these blessings will come upon you…. However, if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands…all these curses will come upon you and overtake you…" (see Deuteronomy 28:1-2; 15 and the entire chapter).
The Bible must come first. Why? If you begin to construct your theological convictions on the authority and infallibility of Scripture, you will be building upon a solid foundation. You may still have questions. You may still hold wrong views. But as you acquire a greater understanding of God’s Word, your doctrines will begin to conform to the truth that God wants each of us to embrace. But if you believe that your own opinions or the writings of fallible people are to be trusted more than God, you will be building on a crumbling foundation. Opinions are fickle. Scholars, each with his or her own bias, are also fickle. The wisdom of today becomes the foolishness of tomorrow. But God’s Word, ancient that it is, remains eternally true and relevant. As God declares in his Word: "…All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the Word of the Lord stands forever" (1 Peter 1:24-25).
Gary S. Wales has been pastor of Trowbridge United Methodist Church. He and his wife and five children live in Otsego, Michigan. This article has been excerpted with permission from The Essential Truths (Bristol Books). Copyright 1997 by Den Slattery and Gary Wales.
This article was published in the March/April 1998 issue of Good News.