Eamon Younis: The Second London Confession On The Doctrine Of Scripture (Part 1): An Exposition of Chapter 1, “Of the Holy Scriptures” (1.1)

By Robert P. Martin

Dr. Robert P. Martin is Pastor of Emmanuel Reformed Baptist Church, Seattle, Washington and Editor of Reformed Baptist Theological Review.

Our Confession of Faith (following the Westminster Confession and the Savoy Declaration) begins with the doctrine of Scripture. This is not true of all confessions of faith. For instance, the First London Baptist Confession (1644) commences with the subject of the Incomprehensibility of God, then proceeds to treat the Trinity, God’s Decree, Creation and the Fall, and Election unto Eternal Life. Only then, when it takes up the blessing of eternal life, which is “to know the only true God,” does the First London Confession consider “the Rule of this Knowledge,” or the doctrine of Scripture (1st LCF 7).

Why did the authors of our Confession follow the Westminster and Savoy rather than the First London? Certainly there is more in play than a desire to agree with the Presbyterians and Independents wherever they could. The authors of our Confession wished to do that, as they affirmed in their preface To the Judicious and Impartial Reader, but we must not miss the point that they also shared with these brethren the desire to express at the outset of confessing the faith the foundation of all that would follow.[1] As Benjamin Keach said, “the truth and authority of God’s Word” is “the very foundation of all [our] hope and religion.”[2] This conviction placed the doctrine of Scripture at the beginning of our Confession. At a time when conflict with Rome over the authority to bind men’s consciences (authoritas in rebus fidei ac morum) was far from over in England, when Anabaptist errors concerning continuing revelation (revelatio immediata and revelatio nova) were making inroads, and when erroneous ideas of the relation of natural and supernatural revelation also were being promoted, our spiritual forefathers wanted to state up front the formal principle of the Protestant Reformation, i.e., Sola Scriptura, the doctrine that the Holy Scriptures alone are normative for ordering the faith and conduct of God’s people. Rome’s errors continue (indeed, are enlarged) in our day, the so-called Charismatic Movement also has taken positions opposed to much of what is said in these paragraphs, and men are still confused about the reality and role of “the light of nature.” This chapter is as relevant today as when it was penned.[3]

The Necessity of Scripture (1.1) [4]

1. The Holy Scripture[5] is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience; although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, as to leave men inexcusable; yet are they not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and his will which is necessary unto salvation. Therefore it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in divers manners to reveal himself, and to declare that his will unto his church; and afterward for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing; which maketh the Holy Scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people being now ceased.

Our Confession begins in a slightly different way than the Westminster Confession, prefacing the words with which the Westminster’s chapter on Scripture opens (“although the light of nature . . .”) with a statement that greatly emphasizes the Bible’s uniqueness, necessity, and indispensability: “The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience.”[6] Before addressing any other issue, this affirmation underscores the uniqueness of the Bible in the authority structure of the Christian faith. The key word is “only.” When it comes to what Christians must know, believe, and do, . . .

1. Only the Holy Scripture is a sufficient rule. [7]

As used here, the word “sufficient” means “of adequate quality” and “of a quantity, extent, or scope adequate to a certain purpose or object.”[8] By using the word “sufficient,” the authors of the Confession likely intended a twofold focus: (1) that the Holy Scriptures are of adequate quality to be the rule of Christian knowledge, faith, and obedience, and (2) that the Holy Scriptures are of an adequate quantity or scope to serve this end. The general idea in the Confession’s use of this term, therefore, is that the Bible is “enough.” In applying the adjective “sufficient” to the Holy Scripture, the Confession affirms that the inscripturated Word of God is adequate or competent in quality and scope to teach us all that we must know, believe, and do in order to be saved from our sins and to walk with God in the way of his appointment. Thomas Manton ably states the doctrine this way:

The Scripture is a sufficient rule of Christian faith, or a record of all necessary Christian doctrines, without any supplement of unwritten traditions, as containing any necessary matter of faith, and is thus far sufficient for the decision of all controversies [i.e., concerning what to believe or how to behave].[9]

The implication of the Bible’s sufficiency, of course, is far-reaching, in that it points to the finality of Scripture as a source of human knowledge of God’s truth and will and now excludes every other source of special divine revelation.[10] And as our dependence on Scripture for saving and walking light is total, the doctrine of the Bible’s sufficiency invites us to exercise that reliance in complete confidence in its ability to address every legitimate question that arises in our living the Christian life.[11]

2. Only the Holy Scripture is a certain rule.

As used here, the term “certain” means “determined, fixed, settled; not variable or fluctuating; unfailing” and “sure, unerring, not liable to fail; to be depended upon; wholly trustworthy or reliable” and “established as a truth or fact to be absolutely received, depended, or relied upon; not to be doubted, disputed, or called in question; indubitable, sure.”[12] Understood in this sense, therefore, when the authors of the Confession called the Holy Scripture “certain,” they were saying that its teaching on every subject that it addresses, in every place that it addresses it, is trustworthy and may be relied on as a light for one’s pathway in walking with God. Further, the Bible is unique in that it “only” or alone has this quality. Implied, therefore, is that “only” the teaching of Holy Scripture is incontrovertible, i.e., it alone is not capable of being overturned by a higher authority (for no higher authority can exist for us than God speaking in his inscripturated Word). The corollary to this, of course, is that every other alleged source of religious knowledge–whether reason, experience, tradition, popes or councils, inner witness or gifts of the Spirit, must be regarded as uncertain and unreliable, to be doubted and if necessary disputed and rejected.

3. Only the Holy Scripture is an infallible rule.

As used here, the term “infallible” means “incapable of erring” and “not liable to prove false, erroneous, or mistaken; that unfailingly holds good.”[13] Used in this sense, the term means not containing error and incapable of error. In saying that “only” the Scripture has this quality, the authors of the Confession emphatically were denying this character to any other alleged source of religious authority.

Many years ago I had dealings with a man who claimed that since our Confession did not use the term “inerrant” but only “infallible,” he was free to teach a view of the Bible which allowed for the presence in it of historical errors. Of course, his position displayed a profound ignorance of the meaning of these important words and of the historical setting in which the Confession was written. We have considered the definition of “infallible” above. The term “inerrant,” which means “free from error, unerring,”[14] adds nothing to the meaning of “infallible” that is not already there. At the time the Confession was produced, the term “infallible” was regarded as adequate to convey the ideas of not containing error and incapable of error. Only when the term “infallible” began to be used with a limited sense did defenders of the orthodox view of Scripture also begin to add the word “inerrant” in an effort to guard the term “infallible” from abuse.[15]

Our Confession therefore affirms that the Bible is unique as a source of religious authority, i.e., unique as a sufficient, certain, infallible rule by which the consciences of God’s people are to be bound. In taking this position, our spiritual forefathers were denying the claims of Rome and of all others who hold that the Scriptures are inadequate as a rule of religious knowledge, faith, and practice and thus that we need to consult some other source of knowledge in order to fill up what is lacking in the Scriptures.

In support of this doctrine of Scripture, the authors of our Confession cite an array of compelling biblical texts showing that they arrived at this doctrine chiefly because it is the doctrine of Scripture concerning itself.[16] The most comprehensive biblical statement in this regard is 2 Tim. 3:15-17, where Paul says to Timothy,

from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. 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 complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Here Paul reminds Timothy of his own upbringing and directs him concerning the future ministry that God has marked out for him. His focus is the role of the Holy Scriptures in salvation and in the Christian life. In God’s providence, though the son of a Greek, Timothy’s mother and grandmother had instructed him from the OT from earliest childhood. This doubtless had taken place day by day, year by year, with the result that Paul can now say that “from childhood” Timothy has “known the Holy Scriptures.” At some point, of course, Timothy’s knowledge of the Scriptures came to be more than notional (i.e., a mere knowledge of Bible facts and doctrines), in that by God’s grace attending the instruction received, he came to see the force and meaning and personal implications of the things learned. By the Scriptures’ instruction he had himself been made “wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” and by their instruction he was to make continual progress in the Christian life (cf., 1 Tim. 4:13-16). And by preaching the Scriptures he was to bring the Word of God to bear pointedly on his hearers so that it might have the same effect in their lives (cf., 2 Tim. 4:2).

Timothy’s commission on every occasion (“in season and out of season”) was to “preach the word” (2 Tim. 4:2). Taking the Scriptures for what God had designed them to be, i.e., the unique, “God-breathed” repository of saving and sanctifying truth (in which there was nothing superfluous, but all was profitable), he was to “convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.” The Scriptures’ profitableness is so designed by God that where they are preached and believed in relation to those things which pertain to life and godliness (i.e., in relation to the establishment of our doctrine, the reproof of our sins, the correction of our errors in belief and practice, and our instruction in that righteousness that is essential to our walking with God), there the man of God is “complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” Nothing is lacking in the Bible’s instruction, reproof, and correction that must be found in some other place. God has anticipated every legitimate question and circumstance where guidance will be needed by those who wish to live mature, well-equipped Christian lives.

The other texts cited (Isa. 8:20; Luke 16:29, 31; Eph. 2:20) simply confirm what we have seen in 2 Tim. 3:15-17. The Scriptures are the standard by which all claims of religious truth are to be measured. Where men profess to speak in God’s name concerning what we are bound to believe or do, our response must be: “To the law and to the testimony! If they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them” (Isa. 8:20).[17] The “only sufficient, certain, and infallible” source of religious knowledge is the Holy Scriptures–all alleged “knowledge” must be measured by “the law and the testimony.” We must be willing to be persuaded by God’s Word, as that source of truth which alone can make us wise unto salvation, and not seek after any other source of persuasion, as though there were some defect or deficiency in the Scriptures (Luke 16:29, 31). The household of God is being built by its great architect and builder “on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone” (Eph. 2:20). No other foundation is to be sought or poured for the individual or corporate life of God’s people than that marked out by the holy men that God chose and sent, who spoke “as they were moved by the Holy Spirit” (2 Pet. 1:21). Indeed, our Confession’s opening statement about the Bible as the unique source of our faith is amply warranted by the testimony of the Bible itself. “The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience.”

Having begun with this summary statement of the uniqueness of the Scripture’s authority, the Confession continues with the thought with which the Westminster Confession begins: “although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, as to leave men unexcusable; yet are they not sufficient to give that knowledge of God, and of his will, which is necessary unto salvation.”[18] The Westminster Confession begins with the recognition that all divine revelation has not been confined to the Holy Scriptures. By adding the opening statement contained in our Confession, our Baptist forefathers were not denying or diminishing the importance of this fact. Their statement merely strengthens the point contained in the Westminster and Savoy, i.e., that God has made the Bible necessary because of its uniqueness as a source of saving knowledge.

Our Confession follows the Westminster Confession exactly in the remainder of this paragraph. We will examine it following the outline below, adapted from Warfield’s outline of WC 1.1.[19]

The Reality but Insufficiency of Natural Revelation
The Reality and Role of Supernatural Revelation
Supernatural Revelation’s Complete Commitment to the Inspired Scriptures
The Consequent Necessity of Scripture

1. The Reality but Insufficiency of Natural Revelation

In saying that God has also revealed himself in “the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence,” the Westminster Assembly was concerned to express the fact that not all divine revelation is confined to Scripture. This emphasis, however, was not simply in the interest of expressing a comprehensive doctrine of divine revelation. It was designed to address “errors in two extreme directions.”[20] The issue is the relation of natural revelation[21] (and natural theology) and supernatural revelation.[22] Some asserted that all true knowledge is to be derived immediately from the Bible—making this claim not only for religion but also for science.[23] This idea amounted to the virtual denial of natural revelation. Others, notably the Deists (who were doubtless of greater concern to the Westminster divines), asserted that “all true knowledge, that of religion as well as of science and philosophy, is derived from the same revelation,—understanding by revelation simply the discoveries of man in the exercise of his natural powers.”[24] The Deists taught that man has reason and senses with which he may interact with the things in the world around him and in the world within him, and may deduce from this interaction all needful truth (even religious truth). This view, epitomized in 1730 in Matthew Tindal’s Christianity as old as the Creation, or the Gospel a Re-publication of the Religion of Nature, involved denying supernatural revelation altogether. Responding to these erroneous ideas, the Westminster Assembly began its statement on Scripture with a confirmation of belief in both natural and supernatural revelation. In adopting their language on this point, our Confession simply adds its Amen to their concern.

The Westminster Assembly nowhere defined what it meant by “the light of nature.” The use of the conjunction “and” (“although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence”) suggests that they distinguished “the light of nature” from revelation received through “the (divine) works of creation and providence”; however, from the other occurrences of the phrase “the light of nature” in the Westminster Standards, this is not clear.[25] On the one hand, at WCF 21.1, the phrase seems to refer to natural revelation generally.[26] On the other hand, in the Larger Catechism Q.2 (which, like WCF 1.1, addresses the relation of natural and supernatural revelation), “the very light of nature in man” is distinguished from “the works of God.”[27] Since WLC 2 is addressing the same concern as WCF 1.1, we likely are safe in following its lead. If this is correct, we must ask, if (in WCF 1.1) the Westminster divines meant to distinguish between “the light of nature” and “the works of creation and providence” as these things relate to natural revelation, in what sense do they do so?

Francis Turretin, whose Institutes of Elenctic Theology is generally regarded as reflective of the mainstream of Reformed theology in the Seventeenth Century, identifies human reason as “the light of nature.” Commenting on the views of the Deists, i.e., of “various persons who believe that there is sufficient assistance in human reason to enable us to live well and happily,” Turretin remarks, “Therefore they give us their opinion that reason (or the light of nature) is abundantly sufficient for the direction of life and the obtainment of happiness.”[28] Are we then to take the phrase “the light of nature” at WCF (2nd LCF) 1.1 as a reference to human reason? A case certainly may be made for this meaning at WCF 1.6 (“there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature [i.e., sound reason], and Christian prudence [i.e., sanctified wisdom], according to the general rules of the word”).

Other Reformed writers, however, speak in broader terms. Heinrich Heppe says:

The consciousness that there is a God and that it is his duty to worship Him, is a natural and essential possession of man. This innate knowledge of God, the notitia Dei insita [implanted or engrafted knowledge of God], frames itself in man, by the action of his reason and conscience, into the notitia acquisita [acquired knowledge of God]. Hence there is a religio naturalis [natural religion]. Reason causes man to apprehend the idea of God immanent [inherent] to it, and teaches him to rise by inference from the visible world, as the work of God, to its invisible author and ruler. At the same time, conscience teaches man to apprehend God as Him who loves and rewards what is good, abhors and punishes what is wicked, and to whom he is absolutely responsible. . . . This natural knowledge of God is, no doubt, insufficient for attaining eternal blessedness. For man, who is convicted of his sinfulness by his conscience, learns by this, indeed, that God punishes wickedness, but from himself knows nothing of what God’s gracious purpose with the sinner may be. The religio naturalis is, therefore, not salutaris [beneficial, saving], and avails only to render man, if he does not receive [supernatural] revelation, inexcusable. . . . Since man knows himself in his conscience as breaker of God’s command, and, therefore, guilty before God, and yet, through his natural knowledge of God, apprehends God only as righteous Judge of the good and bad, it follows that the religio naturalis can afford man no peace with God, and that it cannot be a sufficing religio in itself or for man. It itself points above itself, in that it awakens in man the need of and the longing for a revelation, through which he may first rightly understand what it means that a God exists, and through which he may apprehend that God can be the God even of the sinner, that God wishes to be sought by the sinner and how He will be found by the sinner.[29]

Commenting on these remarks, Warfield says, “A fair case could be made out–if the anachronism of two centuries did not stand in the way—that Heppe’s statement was the source of the Westminster chapter.”[30] With the concurrence therefore of as astute a student of theology and history as Warfield, we cannot likely be wrong in saying that Heppe points us in the right direction for understanding the meaning of “the light of nature” in WCF (2nd LCF) 1.1. It is more than human reason—perhaps more even than reason and conscience together. Ultimately it is all those faculties, moral and otherwise, that separate men from beasts and that constitute the image of God in man. This divine image, innate in man by God’s design, carries with it a revelation of God’s corresponding attributes (moral, intellectual, aesthetic, etc.), so that man has by constitution a notitia Dei insita, an implanted and therefore internal knowledge of God. The faculties which the divine image bestows also function as the apparatus by which man processes the external (i.e., to man’s self-consciousness) information about God that he has revealed in his works of creation (i.e., in what he has made) and providence (i.e., in what he has done and continues to do in the world). As Macpherson says, “The results of that natural theology, which is recognized in our Confession, are reached by a twofold process of intuition [a looking within] and observation [a looking without].”[31]

This natural revelation is a real and trustworthy (for the purpose for which God designed it) but insufficient revelation.[32] Moreover, it not only is not salutaris in itself but also “man cannot of himself apprehend what he apprehends of God by reason and conscience as it ought to be apprehended.”[33] In other words, not only is natural revelation not sufficient in itself to make a man wise unto salvation (nor did God design it to be) but fallen man (whose faculties as God’s image bearer do not operate perfectly) is insufficient to the task of processing it with absolute clarity. Nevertheless, by it men can know of God’s existence and something of his being and character (that he is good, wise, powerful, etc.); but it is insufficient to “give that knowledge of God and his will which is necessary unto salvation.” Natural revelation is sufficient only to leave men without excuse for their sins and for not seeking more knowledge of God than he has given in “the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence.”

Concerning the knowledge of God conveyed to man by natural revelation, the Confession here focuses on “the goodness, wisdom, and power of God.” That these attributes of God may be deduced from natural revelation is the testimony of Scripture and accords with the experience of every reasonable man. We must not think, however, that this language is meant to exhaust the knowledge of God attainable by natural revelation.[34] This language is merely representative. The framers were not trying to produce a comprehensive statement of the doctrine of natural revelation and natural theology. In light of their primary concern in this paragraph, which was to point to the absolute necessity of Scripture for making men wise unto salvation, their purpose was to say just enough to underscore the insufficiency of natural revelation to this end.

The scriptural support cited for our Confession’s doctrine of natural revelation begins with Rom. 1:19-21, where Paul addresses the specific case of those who refuse God’s revelation of himself in creation. They are guilty of “suppressing the truth in unrighteousness,” Paul says, “because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them” (1:19). The purpose of this statement is to show that in natural revelation all men have enough knowledge of the truth to substantiate the charge of their suppressing truth in their execution of an ungodly and unrighteous course. What Paul says is true of all who reject Jehovah’s revelation of himself in the things that he has made and who refuse to worship and serve him, the one true and living God. All such men are without excuse.

Paul characterizes the content of the creation revelation spurned by the pagan world as τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ, i.e., “that which is known of God” (ASV, following the NT usage of γνωστός) or “what may be known of God” (KJV, NKJV; following the classical use). Arguing for the classical use of γνωστός, Godet says that Paul means: “What can be known of God without the help of an extraordinary revelation.”[35] It should be taken, however, in the sense of “what is known of God without the help of special revelation.” Paul is speaking of real knowledge of those things that are known by all men by virtue of God’s revelation of himself in creation. That he speaks of actual and not just potential knowledge is evident from the way that he describes the reality of this knowledge and how it is treated by sinners–“who suppress the truth in unrighteousness” (1:18), “although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God” (1:21), “who exchanged the truth of God for the lie” (1:25). This is a vital point in showing how inexcusable men are. To be guilty of not knowing the knowable is one thing; to be guilty of suppressing what actually is known is quite another. One may be tempted to soften the charge that Paul makes by thinking that the sin in view is to some degree excusable because men do not perceive sufficiently what God has revealed of himself in nature. But that is not what Paul says. He charges all pagans with knowing God (to the degree that he has revealed himself in nature) and with rejecting that truth (if not at a religious or philosophical level, at a practical level as far as morals are concerned).

The knowledge of which Paul speaks “is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them” (1:19). The words “manifest” and “shown” are from the same root (φανερόν . . . ἐφανέρωσεν, cf., ASV). Thayer suggests that the adjective φανερός means “plainly recognized or known.”[36] Friberg says that the word, when denoting “intellectual perception,” means “recognized, (well-)known,” then “evident, clear, plain.”[37] The knowledge of God revealed in nature therefore has this quality—it is not obscure. It is clear and plainly recognized by all men (though many try to suppress it). In fact, it is natural revelation’s lack of obscurity that makes its rejection so inexcusable (if it were obscure and vague, so that only the most studious or intelligent could decipher it, then most of the world would be excused).

And how did this knowledge of God come to be so clear and so plainly recognized? Paul says that it “is manifest in them (ἐν αὐτοῖς), because God has manifested (ἐφανέρωσεν) it to them (αὐτοῖς).” The verb φανερόω, meaning “to make known, to cause to be seen, to show,” here is synonymous with ἀποκαλύπτω (cf., 1:18) and underscores the fact of God’s clear revelation of the truth so plainly known.[38] In other words, natural (creation) revelation is plainly known because God has plainly shown it to men.[39]

God has revealed himself in nature. “For since the creation of the world his invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood in the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse” (1:20). There are a number of important points contained in this verse.

First, the time of this revelation is described in the words “since the creation of the world” or “from the creation of the cosmos” (ἀπὸ κτίσεως κόσμου). Here, ἀπό with the ablative denotes “the temporal terminus from which.”[40] Paul is saying that ever since God created the cosmos, the self-revelation here referred to has been present in the world, i.e., it has been “continuous ever since the creation.”[41] This is a vital point in Paul’s argument, since it demonstrates that this revelation has been known by men in every age and in every place. In this sense it is general and universal and thus leaves all men inexcusable.

And what is the content of God’s self-revelation in creation? Paul says that God’s “invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood in (through, ASV; by, i.e., by means of, NKJV) the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.”

In the expression “his invisible things (attributes, NKJV; qualities, NIV) are clearly seen,” Paul uses what appears to be an oxymoron, i.e., a combination of terms that ordinarily do not go together (“invisible . . . clearly seen”). What God is in himself is “invisible,” i.e., he is a Spirit and neither he nor his attributes are discernable to human senses directly (cf., Col. 1:15; 1 Tim. 1:17; Heb. 11:27). And yet, Paul says, what God is isn’t just seen but “clearly seen,”[42] i.e., by deduction from “the things that are made.” What God is, though not discernable directly by the senses, is revealed in and through the things that he has made.[43] When the senses are turned toward those things and the mind considers the data mediated through them, as Prof. Murray says, “what is sensuously imperceptible is nevertheless clearly apprehended in mental conception.”[44] Or, as Godet says, “The complex phrase νοούμενα καθορᾶται . . . contains two intimately connected ideas: on the one hand, a viewing with the outward sense; on the other, an act of intellectual perception, whereby that which presents itself to the eye becomes at the same time a revelation to our consciousness.”[45] In a similar way, Shedd says, “The invisible attributes of God are clearly perceived by the human mind, in the exercise of reason stimulated into activity by the notices of the senses.”[46] We may see this illustrated, e.g., in one of “the invisible things” of God that Paul mentions in this place, i.e., in his δύναμις or “power.” One may not perceive God’s omnipotence by direct observation of himself but only by observing the effect of that power in the character of his works, beginning with his work of creation.

Paul specifically identifies “the invisible things” of God that are clearly seen in “the things that are made” as “his eternal power and divinity” (ἥ τε ἀΐδιος αὐτοῦ δύναμις καὶ θειότης). The terms that he uses seem chosen to express the simplest yet most comprehensive idea of who God reveals himself to be in natural revelation.[47] Paul does not say that these are all of “the invisible things” of God revealed in creation. He is not setting out a full doctrine of natural revelation but only speaking in such terms as are suited to making the point at hand–which is that God has revealed himself in creation with sufficient particularity and clarity so as to leave those who refuse that revelation without excuse.

Shedd says, “the first impression produced by the visible creation is that of omnipotence.”[48] Godet concurs:

Power is that which immediately arrests man, when the spectacle of nature presents itself to his view. In virtue of the principle of causality innate in his understanding, he forthwith sees in this immense effect the revelation of a great cause; and the Almighty is revealed to him.[49]

No man, of course, may rightly stop with a conception simply of eternal power as the cause standing behind the effect observed (i.e., creation). The things that are made are marked by order and evident design, i.e., by wisdom, such as no impersonal power, no matter how great, could accomplish. The evidence points to “intelligent design,” which (despite the willingness of some in our day to stop with this language) means θειότης or “divinity.”[50] The Bible has no concept of power, as Paul here speaks of it, apart from its identification as God’s power (cf., Matt. 26:63-64). The lesson, therefore, of natural revelation is that it is the work not just of almighty power but of Almighty God. Further, the creation is not an effect arising from an personal, powerful, but amoral, cause. We may see this in different ways; however, the plainest proof is the presence in man of conscience as one of the faculties with which God has endowed him. The presence in us of a conscience that approves of good and disapproves of evil is a powerful witness to the moral goodness of him who created man in his image. The power displayed in creation therefore is plainly directed by goodness, so that we must speak ultimately of the Almighty and Good God.

In preaching to the Gentiles, Paul began with God’s identity as Creator, moving from there to his works of providence (cf., Acts 14:15-17; 17:24-27). By these means, Almighty God has revealed himself to all men. All who refuse this gracious and clear revelation are ἀναπολόγητος (“without defense”).[51] This is the condition of all men, who, regardless of their religiousness or personal or cultural morality, suppress the truth that they are accountable to the Almighty and Good God who has revealed himself in the things that he has made. Further along, Paul also charges the pagan world with refusing a knowledge of God’s moral will (cf., 1:32), so that it is clear that the revelation that makes the pagan world accountable is not merely ontological (i.e., of God’s being), nor merely cosmological (i.e., of God’s power manifested in creation), but also moral (i.e., of God’s holy character and holy will). This revelation, therefore, very much has the character of law to which all men are accountable.[52]

In sum, even if there were no other texts of Scripture that address the point, Rom. 1:19-21 is sufficient to say that natural revelation testifies to every man not only of the bare existence of God but also of his “goodness, wisdom, and power.” The Confession, however, also cites Rom. 2:14-15 and Psa. 19:1-3, in which the Bible testifies to the reality of natural revelation both in its internal form (i.e., internal to man, in the form of conscience, Rom. 2:14-15) and in its external form (i.e., external to man, in the form of the heavens which declare God’s glory, Psa. 19:1-3).[53]

2. The Reality and Role of Supernatural Revelation

Therefore it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in divers manners to reveal himself, and to declare that his will unto his Church;[54]

The “therefore” with which this statement begins points back to what already has been said about the insufficiency of natural revelation. Although real and useful, “the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence” do not convey the whole of God’s purposed self-revelation. In particular, it is “not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and his will which is necessary unto salvation.” This fact is plain on the surface of the case,[55] for natural revelation contains not a single word about Jesus Christ and salvation from sin through faith in him. That knowledge, and all that pertains to it, God has revealed in another way, i.e., in the revelatory word.[56]

The language used by the Confession at this point is derived in part from Heb. 1:1, the text cited in support. Concerning this other, verbal form of revelation, the Scripture here says that “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” (Heb. 1:1-2, KJV). This text confronts us with the dramatic and critical declaration that God has spoken (“God spake . . . God has spoken”) not just by means “of the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence” but by means of supernatural verbal revelations “in/by the prophets” and “in/by his Son.”[57] This is the fact on which everything else said in the letter of Hebrews is built, the foundation to which every doctrine and admonition ultimately refers back. Everything that the writer says presupposes that God has spoken, and especially that he has made a final revelation of himself and of his will by means of speaking in his Son. This text, of course, tells us that God did not say everything at once. It points to two epochs of God’s speaking, i.e., “in time past” and “at the end of these days.”

In the first epoch of God’s revelatory speaking (i.e., “in time past”), he spoke “in many different parts” and “in many different ways.” From the beginning, God has been saying things about himself and his will for his creation. As we examine the OT we learn that these verbal revelations came in different portions and in different ways at different times and under different circumstances. God said some things to man in his innocence. Man’s fall into sin was answered by the revelation of other things–primarily a word of judgment and the promise of the coming of “the seed of the woman” who would be victorious over the serpent. Then, as God’s work of redemption progressed, so did his verbal revelation. God progressively revealed himself and his redemptive will by way of a series of redemptive covenants, in the course of which his verbal revelations became fuller and clearer. Sometimes he spoke by vision or dream, by prophet or priest or king, by angel or theophany, by Urim and Thummin, or (as in the case of Moses) by verbal declaration delivered face to face. But though all these revelations were true, none of them was exhaustive or consummative. They were fragmentary revelations of God and his redemptive will. Not even all of them together comprised all that God had determined to say. In a word, this first epoch of God’s revelatory speaking is marked by incompleteness.

In the second epoch of God’s revelatory speaking (i.e., “at the end of these days”), God “has spoken in a Son.”[58] That this verbal revelation is final and complete (beyond which nothing more will be said or should be expected) is very much part of the argument of the book of Hebrews. That this is the case is evident from several things present in this text.

First, the character of the person in whom God spoke requires the finality and completeness of that speaking. Ebrard rightly observes,

“God spake to us by one who was Son,” who stood not [just] in the relation of prophet, but in the relation of Son to him. If it were ἐν τῷ Υἱῶ, then Christ would be placed as this individual, in opposition to the individuals of the prophets; but as the article is wanting, it is the species that is placed in opposition to the species, although, of course, Christ is the single individual of his species.[59]

In other words, Christ is different from all who came before him. If Jesus had been merely a prophet in a long line of prophets, but not to be distinguished from them in anything but the quantity or quality of the revelations that God spoke in him, then there is nothing necessarily consummative about these revelations. In this case we would be warranted to look for other prophets of like character who may yet appear with fuller and clearer revelations from God.[60] But since Jesus is Son of God, unique in his person, superior not just in degree but in kind to the prophets who came before him, beyond whom no greater figure can appear, then the revelations spoken “in him” must also be superior not just in degree but in kind, in that they are consummative and final, beyond which nothing more will be said.

This, of course, is how the writer of Hebrews proceeds. Following immediately the declaration that God has “spoken to us in a Son,” he tells us specific ways that Jesus is infinitely superior in his person and station to all who spoke from God before him (cf., 1:2-13). He also is a “sent one” (ἀπόστολος) like Moses (who was a servant in God’s house), but he is so much more, for he is the Son (cf., 3:1ff.). On this basis, the writer presses the absolute necessity of giving the most extraordinary heed to that “which having at the first been spoken through the Lord [i.e., the Son], was confirmed unto us by them that heard; God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders, and by manifold powers, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to his own will” (2:1-4). Even as the Son is a priest like no priest who has gone before, so he is a prophet like no prophet who has gone before. And even as under the terms of the New Covenant there is no need for a further, greater priestly sacrifice, so there is no need for further, greater verbal revelation to make up what is (obviously not) lacking in God’s having “spoken in a Son.”

John says that in the Word becoming flesh, grace and truth have come—“the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, hath declared him (Jn. 1:17-18). This language is suitable only for describing a consummate revelation. Or as Paul says, in Christ “dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9). Or as the Father himself says, “This is my Son, my chosen: hear him” (Luke 9:35). And in hearing him, we hear not just a messenger sent from God but the message itself. The Word did not become flesh just to deliver a message about the way of salvation, or about the truth of God, or about eternal life, or about the resurrection, or about the beginning and end of all things. No! His message was, “I am the bread of life” (John 6:35), “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6), “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25), “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end” (Rev. 22:13). This is who he is! His identity then tells us that the word that God spoke in him is final and complete. As Owen says, “For as this was the last way and means that God ever designed for the discovery of himself, as to the worship and obedience which he requires, so the person by whom he accomplished this work makes it indispensably necessary that it be also absolutely perfect, from which nothing can be taken, to which nothing must be added.”[61]

Second, the verb tense that the writer uses further underscores the finality of God’s speaking in his Son. Although the speaking of God in his Son encompassed also the speaking of the apostles and prophets of the New Covenant who were sent by Christ, and ended with the writing of the NT documents, which took their rightful place in the God-breathed Scriptures (cf., 2 Tim. 3:15-17; 2 Pet. 3:15-16), the writer of Hebrews (even as he is penning Holy Scripture) speaks of the final epoch of revelation as complete, saying not “God is speaking in a Son” (i.e., ongoingly) but “God has spoken in a Son” (i.e., consummately).[62] The writer plainly did not expect new information from heaven beyond that which he presses on his readers as already spoken in God’s Son.

Third, the writer’s lack of qualification concerning God’s speaking in his Son points to its finality. Brown says, “There is nothing in the description of the Gospel revelation that answers to the two phrases—‘at sundry times and in divers manners;’ but the ideas which they naturally suggest to the mind are, the completeness of the Gospel revelation compared with the imperfection of the Jewish.”[63]

Fourth, the writer refers to his own day in language which speaks, to the ears of all who knew the O T Scriptures, of finality and consummation. “In time past” (πάλαι) denotes an epoch now past as compared to the present age. The present age is the time of God’s speaking in his Son. The expression ἐπ᾿ ἐσχάτου τῶν ἡμερῶν τούτων answers by way of fulfillment to the epoch prophesied in the OT expression (so often found in the prophets) בְּאַחֲרִית הַיָּמִים (“in the latter days” or “at the extremity of the days”).[64] The writer of Hebrews believed himself to be living in this final epoch marked by God’s speaking in his Son. And as he used these words, he knew that his Jewish readers would recognize a claim to finality in God’s speaking in his Son. As Owen says, “the Jews, with whom the apostle had to do, had all of them an expectation of a new signal and final revelation of the will of God, to be made by the Messiah in the last days.”[65] Hebrews teaches us that this has now come to pass.

“At the end of these days” (“in the fullness of the times,” Eph. 1:10), “God spoke to us in a Son.” And in his Son, he made a full declaration of himself and his redemptive will and established the final covenant by which he will deal with men and by which he will bring his many redemptive promises to fulfillment. If the writer of Hebrews did not wish to speak of the finality and completeness of the verbal revelation that God had spoken in his Son, he could hardly have written in a more confusing way, for all his language would have been interpreted by his Jewish contemporaries as having this meaning. He used this language because this was the message he wished to convey.

The purpose of supernatural revelation, whether given in provisional form in the prophets or in consummate form in God’s speaking in a Son, is to make men wise unto salvation and to equip them for every good work. As we will see farther on, this makes supernatural revelation (and the Scriptures) necessary and indispensable.

3. Supernatural Revelation’s Complete Commitment to the Inspired Scriptures

. . . and afterward for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing;

Viewed from one perspective, only verbal revelation from God (and not inscripturated verbal revelation) is necessary to make men wise unto salvation and to completely equip them for every good work. As Waldron says, “Men have been saved without the Scriptures, but not without redemptive revelation.”[66] That this is the case may be deduced from the fact that men have been converted and walked with God without the Scriptures. This was the case with Enoch and Noah and Abraham and others before Moses penned the first books of the Bible. Although these men had primitive redemptive revelation, they did not possess Scripture.[67]

The language of the Confession therefore is cautious–speaking of God’s inscripturating his verbal revelation as being “for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church.” Nonetheless, we must be careful to understand the Westminster divines correctly.[68] This language notwithstanding, they also say (in this paragraph) that the Holy Scriptures are “most necessary.” This affirmation arises from the difficulties which verbal revelation without inscripturation encounter in the world and from God’s consequent solution to the problem caused by these difficulties.

In order for the purposes for which God spoke to be fulfilled, hisrevelation (in its parts and as a whole) had to be preserved pure and communicated to the churches, the nations, and future generations in a pure form. Revelation in merely oral form, however, was unacceptably exposed to the eroding and polluting effects of “the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world.”[69] Here we see the Scriptures in their place not in an ideal world but in a fallen world, in which the corruption of men and the animosity of Satan to the truth are potent realities. Even God’s people could not be counted on to succeed in adequately preserving and propagating God’s truth, for our flesh (our remaining indwelling sin) is still active. And thus, for example, in the years before the NT was written, many innovations were introduced into the doctrine and practice of the churches (by friends as well as foes) which were not warranted by what God had spoken in his Son. In no small degree the books of the NT are God’s response to this reality. He caused the writing of new Scriptures “for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church.” Now, as the writers of the books of the Bible did this at the moving of God’s Spirit, so in the final analysis it was God himself who committed his verbal revelation “wholly unto writing.” In his wisdom, he does all things in the best way; therefore, his wisdom and will produced the Scriptures as the best solution to the necessities of the establishment of his church in a fallen world. Perhaps God could have preserved and propagated the truth in another way, but he did not choose to do so.[70]

4. The Consequent Necessity of Scripture

. . . which maketh the Holy Scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God's revealing his will unto his people being now ceased.

Turretin says, “It was necessary for a written word to be given to the church that the canon [rule] of true Christian faith might be constant and unmoved.”[71] This is certainly the case. And given what God has done, regardless of what may have pertained in earlier periods, the Scriptures now are absolutely necessary to the ongoing “preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church.” As Turretin sagely observes:

Hence the divine ordination being established, it is made necessary to the church, so that it pertains not only to the well-being (bene esse) of the church, but also to its very existence (esse). Without it the church could not now stand. So God indeed was not bound to the Scriptures, but he has bound us to them.[72]

The Confession also ties the necessity of the Scriptures to the cessation of all former ways of knowing God’s verbal revelation–“those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people being now ceased.” No longer does God speak in dreams, visions, or by audible voice. No longer are Christ, or inspired prophets and apostles, present to tell us God’s word. This is a fact of great importance, for if God still speaks through men, then the Scriptures are not so necessary. This, of course, is the conclusion to which all who believe that we still live in the age of ongoing verbal revelation eventually must come. Rome with its popes and councils, the Charismatics with their new apostles and prophets and words of knowledge and tongues, do not find the Bible so necessary as those of us who regard the Holy Scriptures as “the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience.” For us, the Bible is absolutely necessary and indispensable.

That “those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people” have “now ceased,” is a logical deduction from at least four facts: First, an assumption of the cessation of verbal revelation follows from the teaching of Heb. 1:1-2 concerning the finality and completeness of the revelation which God spoke in his Son. As argued before, this revelation was patently consummative, beyond which we are not warranted to believe that more will be given. If God has spoken in his Son, what greater prophet will succeed him so as to add or take away from this revelation?

Second, the Bible’s own doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture (cf., above and at 2nd LCF 1.6) makes further revelation superfluous. If the Scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation and able to completely equip us for every good work, what need is there of further revelation at all? As the history of the church proves, there are no new questions, only new questioners. Even as the Scriptures have held the answers to these questions in the past, so they continue to function as a perfect repository of religious truth today, so that, as the Confession later says, “The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down or necessarily contained in the Holy Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelation of the Spirit, or traditions of men” (1.6). If God has so spoken in his Word, what question can conceivably arise which would require a further word from God not already contained in the Scriptures?

Third, the circumstances in which verbal revelation has been given in the past lead us to believe that no further such revelation is forthcoming. The progressive nature of the historical self-revelation of God is inseparably connected with God’s activity in redemption, which itself was “historically successive.”[73] As Vos rightly says, since “revelation is the interpretation of redemption; it must, therefore, unfold itself in installments as redemption does. . . . Redemption is partly objective and central, partly subjective and individual. . . . Now revelation accompanies the process of objective-central redemption only.”[74] What we must understand by this is that when God acts redemptively in history, whether redeeming men from the Flood in the Ark or from Egypt in the Exodus or from Babylon in the Restoration or from sin at Calvary, he accompanies his redemptive acts with revelation that explains and interprets what he is doing.

Now, as Vos observes, verbal revelation accompanied the objective and central redemptive acts of God, i.e., as the divinely given interpretation of these redemptive acts. God’s redemptive acts are not self-explanatory. The clearest proof of this may be seen at the cross. The cross is not a self-interpreting event. If you had been standing at the foot of the cross, though you would have observed more than an ordinary crucifixion because of the darkness of the heavens and the shaking of the earth, and though you would have heard things said that were unusual for a criminal being crucified, yet you would not have interpreted the event itself in the way that our Lord and his apostles did. In order for subsequent generations to understand the cross, accompanying revelation was absolutely essential.

The cross is a central and objective redemptive act. It is an epoch-making[75] act and it concerns all of the people of God. Subjective and individual redemptive acts concern only specific individuals. For example, when God by his Spirit regenerated me and gave me the graces of faith and repentance, it was a subjective and individual redemptive act. It was not a central redemptive act that concerns all of God’s people but an individual dispensation of grace.[76]

Therefore, if Vos is correct in saying that “special revelation accompanies the process of objective-central redemption only” (and this is certainly correct), we must expect an outpouring of the prophetic spirit (an outpouring of verbal revelation) only in association with great redemptive acts such as the Exodus or the coming of Messiah. God does not give new revelation in conjunction with ordinary events in the life of his people or church. This point must be pressed because the idea is embraced by many in our generation that revelation is continuing. Charismatics especially claim to be receiving continuing special revelation from God. This is not the case for a variety of reasons; but high on the list of proofs is the fact that God is not performing objective-central redemptive acts in our day. And since this is so, the presumption must be, as our Confession says, that “those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people” have “now ceased.”[77]

Fourth, the history of cases where allegedly further verbal revelation has been received is such as to underscore dramatically the judgment that verbal revelation indeed ceased with Christ and the apostles. Such a history would require multiple volumes; however, this much is clear even on the surface of the matter–where further verbal revelation has been claimed, it has fallen into three categories: (1) the republication of truths already in the Bible, in which case these “revelations” are superfluous;[78] (2) puerilities, in which ongoing verbal revelation is regarded as a kind of Christian Ouija board;[79] (3) the publication of error and heresy, in instances so numerous as to defy cataloging. In each of these cases, the alleged new revelations from God contain nothing of value for the people of God. Moreover, where supposed new revelations are welcomed or sought, there is always a diminishing of the Bible’s authority in the lives of God’s people and usually a decline in the use of the Bible in the regulating of faith and practice. History is a valuable teacher, and the history of so-called new revelations from God is such as to cause us to say without reservation that “those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people” have “now ceased.”

Given the testimony of the Bible itself concerning the finality of God’s word spoken in his Son, concerning the sufficiency of the Scriptures, concerning the circumstances in which God has given verbal revelation in the past, given the lessons of history concerning alleged new revelations, surely we cannot but believe that if we wander from the Scriptures, we wander also from the mind of God and his will for us. The doctrine of our Confession therefore is correct, so that we say to those who “chirp” and “mutter,” and to those who seek after them, “To the law and to the testimony! if they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them” (Isa. 8:19-20).

Notes

Speaking of the Westminster Confession, Warfield says, “As the Confession accords with the fundamental idea and ordinary practice of the Reformed theology, in beginning its exposition of doctrine with the doctrine of Holy Scripture, as the root out of which all doctrine grows, because the Scriptures are the fountain from which all knowledge of God’s saving purpose and plan flows; so in stating the doctrine of Scripture it follows the logical and natural order of topics which had been wrought out by and become fixed in the Reformed theology.” Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, “The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture,” in The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 2003), 6:191. In a similar vein, John Macpherson says, “This chapter seems to have received from the Westminster divines more than ordinary consideration. They made it the subject of long deliberation and debate, and the deliverance to which they came regarding Holy Scripture was evidently viewed by them as very much like the issuing of a programme. Their whole system may be estimated by an examination of their first article. The Confession is characteristically Biblical, and consistently with this character it opens with the article ‘Of the Holy Scripture,’–while most other Confessions, as for example the Thirty-nine Articles, open with chapters on God and the Trinity.” John Macpherson, The Westminster Confession of Faith, with Introduction and Notes (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1881), 29.
Benjamin Keach, Preaching from the Types and Metaphors of the Bible (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1972), xiii.
Shaw says, “There are few doctrines of supernatural revelation that have not, in one period or another, been denied or controverted; and it is a peculiar excellence of the Westminster Confession of Faith, that its compilers have stated the several articles in terms the best calculated, not only to convey an accurate idea of sacred truths, but to guard against contrary errors.” Robert Shaw, An Exposition of the Westminster Confession of Faith (reprint ed., Fearn, Scotland: Christian Focus Publications, 1992), 1-2. Waldron says that the Confession’s “thoughtful and earnest responses to the errors it confronted in its day enlighten basic issues of the faith to this day.” Samuel E. Waldron, A Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith (Darlington, UK: Evangelical Press, 1989), 30.
This heading is taken from the scheme suggested by Warfield, “The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture,” 6:191. Waldron adds the word “indispensability.” Waldron, 28. In taking up the subject of the necessity of Scripture first, the Westminster (followed by the Savoy and 2nd LCF) accords with the remark of Turretin, who said, “As the word of God is the sole principle of theology, so the question concerning its necessity deservedly comes before all things.” Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, trans. George Musgrave Giger, ed. James T. Dennison (Philipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1992), 1:55.
In some places the Confession calls the Word of God the “Scripture,” while in other places it uses the term “Scriptures.” The same phenomena is found in the Westminster Confession and Catechisms. There is no evident reason why this is so, leaving us to conclude that these terms were used interchangeably.
No documentary source of this statement has been identified.
Since the doctrine of the Bible’s sufficiency is the focus of paragraph six, we defer the larger treatment of this subject to that place.
The Oxford English Dictionary, s.v., “Sufficient.” Hereafter, cited as OED. The OED is an indispensable tool for determining the seventeenth-century meaning of English words. This, and not the modern meaning of the words of the Confession, is our first interest. The question is that of authorial intent, a concern which has vanished to an alarming degree in our post-modern world.
Thomas Manton, “The Scripture Sufficient without Unwritten Traditions,” in The Complete Works of Thomas Manton (reprint ed., Worthington, PA: Maranatha Publications, n.d.), 5:487. Or, put another way, as Thomas says, “To ascribe to the Scriptures the attribute of sufficiency is to say that they have the answer to man’s every spiritual need and problem. There is no spiritual problem, circumstance, situation, or difficulty which may enter into the Christian’s life for which the Word of God is not all-sufficient. No additional revelation is necessary.” Thomas A. Thomas, The Doctrine of the Word of God (Nutley, NJ: The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1977), 49-50.
That the epoch of new revelation by other means (e.g., by prophet or apostle or gift of the Spirit) is now past is affirmed at the end of this paragraph: “those former ways of God’s revealing his will unto his people being now ceased.” John Murray says: “Unless we believe that revelation is still in process as it was in the days of the prophets, in the days of our Lord, and in the days of the apostles subsequent to our Lord’s ascension, then Scripture occupies for us an exclusive place and performs an exclusive function as the only extant mode of revelation. . . . Our dependence upon Scripture is total. . . . If Scripture is the inscripturated revelation of the gospel and of God’s mind and will, if it is the only revelation of this character that we possess, then it is this revelation in all its fulness, richness, wisdom, and power that must be applied to man in whatever religious, moral, mental situation he is to be found.” John Murray, “The Finality and Sufficiency of Scripture,” in Collected Writings of John Murray (Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1976), 1:19-21.
Manton says, “Let them [i.e., deniers of the Bible’s sufficiency] name what is necessary beyond what is recommended there [i.e., in the Scriptures], or may be deduced from thence. Yea, it doth contain not only all the essential but also the integral parts of the Christian religion; and therefore nothing can be any part of our religion which is not there. The direction of old was, Isa. viii. 20, ‘To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.’ Everything was then tried by Moses and the prophets, and everything must be now tried by the prophets and apostles, which is our foundation of faith, worship, and obedience, Eph. ii. 20.” Manton, 5:497.
OED, s.v., “Certain.”
OED, s.v., “Infallible.” The exposition section of the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) defines “infallible” in this way: “Infallible signifies the quality of neither misleading nor being misled and so safeguards in categorical terms the truth that Holy Scripture is a sure, safe, and reliable guide in all matters.” This definition is not as precise as one might desire, but is not so defective as to be misleading.
OED, s.v., “Inerrant.” The exposition section of the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) defines “inerrant” in this way: “Similarly, inerrant signifies the quality of being free from all falsehood and mistake and so safeguards the truth that Holy Scripture is entirely true and trustworthy in all its assertions.”
A.A. Hodge thus spoke of “an errorless infallibility of all scriptural affirmations.” Archibald A. Hodge and Benjamin B. Warfield, Inspiration (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1979), 34. And Warfield spoke of the words of Scripture as “perfectly infallible.” Benjamin B. Warfield, “Inspiration and Criticism,” in The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible (reprint ed., Phillipsburg, NJ: The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1948), 420. Waldron says, “It is difficult to deal patiently with such patently contradictory formulas as ‘infallibility rather than inerrancy’ or ‘limited inerrancy.’ Language has rarely been used so dishonestly.” Waldron, 50-51. The charge often is made that Hodge and Warfield invented the doctrine of inerrancy. Jack Rogers’s allegation is typical: “A.A. Hodge and B.B. Warfield developed the doctrine of the inerrancy of the Bible as a defensive, apologetic tool.” Jack B. Rogers, “The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible in the Reformed Tradition,” in Major Themes in the Reformed Tradition, ed. Donald K. McKim (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1992), 60. This charge, however, is not sustainable. The testimony of The New Hampshire Confession (1833) makes the case nicely. Written long before either Hodge or Warfield said anything in defense of the Bible’s inerrancy, the NHC says concerning the Bible that “it has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter” (NHC 1). The doctrine of inerrancy cannot be put in plainer words. From the earliest days, this has been the faith of God’s people. Clement of Rome (A.D. 30-100) admonishes those who are contentious about doctrine and practice, “Look carefully into the Scriptures, which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit. Observe that nothing of an unjust or counterfeit character is written in them” (1 Clement 45). Irenaeus (A.D. 120-202) says, “If, however, we cannot discover explanations of all those things in Scripture which are made the subject of investigation, yet let us not on that account seek after any other God besides Him who really exists. For this is the very greatest impiety. We should leave things of that nature to God who created us, being most properly assured that the Scriptures are indeed perfect, since they were spoken by the Word of God and His Spirit” (Against Heresies 2.28.2). What is this but advice that erring, fallible human judgment should bow before the divine and inerrant/infallible Scriptures? Statements of this character may be found in every age of the church’s history. See, e.g., Augustine, Letters 82.3 (to Jerome); Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion 1.6.3 and 3.2.6; Turretin, 1:62-63. Bridge cites Augustine on this point with approval: “O Lord, said he, let thy Holy Scriptures be my delights, by which I can neither deceive nor be deceived. This is that safe and sure light indeed.” William Bridge, “Scripture Light the Most Sure Light,” in The Works of the Rev. William Bridge (reprint ed., Beaver Falls, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1985), 1:412. Hodge and Warfield were conscious of standing on the firm shoulders of the orthodox in the preceding ages of the Church, saying, “In view of all the facts known to us, we affirm that a candid inspection of all the ascertained phenomena of the original text of Scripture will leave unmodified the ancient faith of the Church. In all their real affirmations these books are without error.” Hodge and Warfield, 27. Citing the influence of Turretin on Princeton Seminary, and, of course, on Hodge and Warfield, Rogers further asserts that “Turretin rather than Calvin molded the nineteenth-century Presbyterian understanding of the authority and interpretation of the Bible” and that the early Princeton men “thought of themselves as followers of Calvin. But in actuality, they believed and taught a theological method regarding the authority and interpretation of the Bible rooted in post-Reformation scholasticism, almost the exact opposite of Calvin’s own approach.” Rogers, 51. In contradiction of this view of early Princeton’s relation to the real Calvin, see John Murray, Calvin on Scripture and Divine Sovereignty (reprint ed., Welwyn, England: Evangelical Press, 1979).
As may be seen by many examples, the authors of the Confession do not cite supporting texts in the order in which they appear in our printed Bibles but in the order of their perceived importance. Thus, here 2 Tim. 3:15-17 is cited before Isa. 8:19-20, etc.
For the many views of the final clause of this verse, see the standard commentaries on Isaiah. The word שַׁחַר, translated “light” in KJV, properly means “morning” or “dawn.” Young’s comments are helpful. “These [the law and the testimony, i.e., the Scriptures] are the standards by which all opinions and utterances are to be judged. If anyone does not speak in accordance with the law and the testimony, he is the one to whom there is no dawn. Whoever speaks not in accordance with these standards is one that still abides in the darkness of sin and unbelief, and hence, one who cannot give light. . . . Light is found in the law of God, the written revelation, the Scriptures. Those who speak contrary to Scripture have no dawn. They remain yet in the darkness of deep night. Upon them the morning light has not broken, nor will it break until they turn as little children to the law and submit all their thinking and opinions to it.” Edward J. Young, The Book of Isaiah, in The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1981), 1:319-320. Barnes remarks that the word שַׁחַר, meaning “the morning light,” is “an emblem of advancing knowledge,” so that the idea is that “if their teachings do not accord with the law and the testimony, it is proof that they are totally ignorant, without even the twilight of true knowledge; that it is total darkness with them.” Albert Barnes, Isaiah, in Notes on the Old Testament (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983), 1:184.
Although Warfield, speaking of the Westminster Confession’s opening chapter, says, “the great source of this chapter is . . . the recognized Reformed theology of the time,” he points more specifically to the influence of the Irish Articles of Religion (1615, believed to have been written largely by James Ussher) and to Ussher’s Body of Divinity (1645). While the Irish Articles did not contain a statement on natural revelation, Ussher’s Body of Divinity did. Also, this emphasis was present in the Belgic Confession (1561). Warfield, “The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture,” 6:169,176-177.
Ibid., 6:191.
Macpherson, 29.
By “natural revelation” is meant God’s revelation of himself and his will in the natural world of things and events, in terms of those things both internal and external to man–styled by the Confession as “the light of nature and the works of creation and providence.”
The terms used to distinguish the two main species of divine revelation are all helpful in their own right. In using the terms “natural revelation” and “supernatural revelation,” I do not wish to discount ideas more closely expressed by other terminology. Commenting on the terms “natural and supernatural,” “general and special,” and “natural and soteriological,” Warfield says, “Each of these modes of discriminating them has its particular fitness and describes a real difference between the two in nature, reach or purpose. The one is communicated through the media of natural phenomena, occurring in the course of Nature or of history; the other implies an intervention in the natural course of things and is not merely in source but in mode supernatural. The one is addressed generally to all intelligent creatures, and is therefore accessible to all men; the other is addressed to a special class of sinners, to whom God would make known His salvation. The one has in view to meet and supply the natural need of creatures for knowledge of their God; the other to rescue broken and deformed sinners from their sin and its consequences.” Benjamin B. Warfield, “The Biblical Idea of Revelation,” in The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, 74.
The most notable proponent of this idea in later years was John Hutchinson, who in 1724-1727 published his Moses’s Principia, in which he tries to refute the doctrine of gravitation as taught in Newton’s Principia. McClintock and Strong say, “According to Hutchinson, the Old Testament contains a complete system of natural history, theology, and religion. The Hebrew language was the medium of God’s communication with man; it is therefore perfect, and consequently, as a perfect language, it must be coextensive with all the objects of knowledge, and its several terms are truly significant of the objects which they indicate, and not so many arbitrary signs to represent them.” On the basis of this premise, Hutchinson argued (as summarized by his editors) that “the Hebrew Scriptures nowhere ascribe motion to the body of the sun, or fixedness to the earth; they describe the created system to be a plenum without any vacuum, and reject the assistance of gravitation, attraction, or any such occult qualities, for performing the stated operations of nature.” Prominent among Hutchinson’s followers were George Horne, William Romaine, and William Parkhurst. McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, s.v., “Hutchinson, John.”
Macpherson, 30.
See WCF 1.6, 10.4, 20.4, 21.1 and WLC 2, 60, 121.
“The light of nature showeth that there is a God, who hath lordship and sovereignty over all; is good, and doth good unto all; and is therefore to be feared, loved, praised, called upon, trusted in, and served, with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the might.” The same broad application of the phrase “the light of nature” (i.e., to refer to natural revelation generally) may also be seen at WCF 10.4, 20.4, and WLC 60.
WLC 2: “Q. How doth it appear that there is a God? A. The very light of nature in man, and the works of God, declare plainly that there is a God; but his word and Spirit only, do sufficiently and effectually reveal him unto men for their salvation.”
Turretin, 1:55.
Heinrich Heppe, Die Dogmatik der evangelish-reformirten Kirche (1861), cited and translated by Warfield, “The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture,” 6:162-163.
Ibid., 6:169.
Also, “There are certain mental aptitudes and moral convictions which belong to human nature, and together constitute an internal instinct. . . . Then there are indications of God from outward nature.” Macpherson, 30. Shaw says, “When we affirm that the being of God may be discovered by the light of nature, we mean, that the senses and the reasoning powers, which belong to the nature of man, are able to give him so much light as to manifest that there is a God. By our senses we are acquainted with his works, and by his works our reason may be led to trace out that more excellent Being who made them.” Shaw, 2.
The Confession returns to this point at 10.4 and 22.1 (WCF 21.1). The latter statement again affirms the reality of “the light of nature” and its proper role in the worship of God. The former statement presses the point that men cannot be saved by that knowledge of God which comes from “the light of nature” (cf., WLC 60).
Heppe, in Warfield, “The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture,” 6:163.
At 22.1 (WCF 21.1), the Confession’s statement is more expansive: “The light of nature shews that there is a God, who hath lordship and sovereignty over all; is just, good, and doth good unto all; and is therefore to be feared, loved, praised, called upon, trusted in, and served, with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the might.”
F. Godet, Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1883), 1:170.
Joseph Henry Thayer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (in BibleWorks), s.v., φανερός.
Timothy and Barbara Friberg, Analytical Lexicon to the Greek New Testament (in BibleWorks), s.v., φανερός.
Friberg, s.v., φανερόω.
There is a question concerning the precise reference of the expression ἐν αὐτοῖς (“in them,” ASV; “within them,” NASB; ESV takes the phrase as equivalent to αὐτοῖς at the end of the verse, i.e., “is plain to them [ἐν αὐτοῖς], because God has shown it to them [αὐτοῖς]”). We may take ἐν αὐτοῖς to mean “among them” (cf., Rom. 1:5,6; 11:17), as Stuart characterizes this view: “in the midst of them, or before their eyes.” Moses Stuart, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (reprint ed., Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, n.d.), 44. Similarly, Cranfield says that Paul’s point is that this revelation is “in their midst and all around them.” C.E.B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, in The International Critical Commentary (reprint ed., Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark Limited, 1980), 1:114. Calvin, however, taking the preposition in its more ordinary sense, says, “He said, in them rather than to them, for the sake of greater emphasis: . . . he seems here to have intended to indicate a manifestation, by which they might be so closely pressed, that they could not evade; for every one of us undoubtedly finds it to be engraven on his own heart.” John Calvin, Commentaries of the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans, trans. John Owen (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1981), 69-70. McBeth, in the same vein, says: “Is within them.” The force of this clause is not that the knowledge of God was revealed to them, but that the knowledge of God is within them by virtue of inherent existence, and as an abiding principle of their nature. “Is” denotes the divinely revealed knowledge to inherently exist as an abiding principle within the consciousness of man. “Within” expresses the realm of God’s ineffaceable revelation–within, in their hearts, upon the consciousness, within the Ego. The truth of God was revealed, not among them, but within them–upon their consciousness, in their hearts (2 :15). The truth of God is vividly manifested, revealed, exhibited openly, shown plainly, laid clearly or openly within them. This revelation came from the personality of God to the inner consciousness of man. What more could God do? How more guilty could man be? Man revolted against God from the very seat of his being. The remainder of this verse says “for God manifested it unto them.” If God wrote Himself into human consciousness and upon the tablets of their hearts, then the revelation was perfect. The revelation registered in their consciousness, “for God manifested it unto them.” Inspiration has just said: “that which is known of God is manifest within them.” The present tense alludes to the permanency of that knowledge in human consciousness. Now, the Spirit says through Paul, “For God manifested it unto them” (ἐφανέρωσεν). The aorist tense shows the act as wrought once for all. When God stamped the knowledge of Himself upon human consciousness, He did it once for all time; that is, no human being has ever been without that knowledge. It is an inherent element in the nature of man. This is the explanation for the universal thirst for God. That is why man must worship, and why the heathen do worship—something. Immorality will defeat the truth of God, but it can never obliterate it from human nature. J.P. McBeth, Exegetical and Practical Commentary on Romans (Old Tappan, NJ: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1937), 51-52.
Thayer, s.v., ἀπό.
Cranfield, 1:114.
The κατά in καθοράω makes ὁράω intensive. Ibid., 1:115.
Aristotle shows that pagan philosophy, at least in the form represented by himself, understood at least the rudiments of the message of creation revelation: “God, who is invisible to every mortal being, is seen by his works” (De Mundo, c.6, cited by Stuart, 46).
John Murray, The Epistle to the Romans, in The New International Commentary on the New Testament (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1975), 1:38.
Godet, 1:171. Italics his.
W.G.T. Shedd, A Critical and Doctrinal Commentary on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans (reprint ed., Minneapolis: Klock & Klock Christian Publishers, 1978), 21.
It is a moot point whether ἀΐδιος (“eternal”) modifies only δύναμις (“power”) or also θειότης (“divinity”). While taking the word as modifying “power,” Prof. Murray rightly says, “The implication is that the eternity of God as well as the eternity of his power is in view.” Murray, Romans, 1:39.
Shedd, 21. Stuart says, “Δύναμις must here have special reference to the creative power of God; and this seems to be called ἀΐδιος, because it must have been possessed antecedently to the creation of the world, or before time began.” Stuart, 45.
Godet, 1:171.
The word θειότης is derived from the adjective θεῖος and means “Godhood” (i.e., divinity) and not “Godhead” (which would require θεότης, cf., Col. 2:9, and which implies the Trinity). At 2 Pet. 1:3, we encounter the expression τῆς θείας δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ, i.e., “his [God’s] divine power.” His divinity is an “invisible thing” of God that is clearly seen in the things that are made.
On whether εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτοὺς ἀναπολογήτους is a purpose clause or a result clause, see Murray, Romans, 1:40.
God’s self-revelation to men (in whatever form it takes) has the character of law, i.e., those who receive it are accountable to God for how they respond to it. To refuse that revelation is to do so “in unrighteousness” and to bring oneself under that condemnation of God’s law which ultimately is manifested in his wrath (cf., Rom. 1:18 with 3:9 and 3:19).
On the question of natural revelation’s insufficiency, though not cited in the 2nd LCF, see 1 Cor. 1:21; 2:13-14, cited in the WCF.
Note that the Confession speaks of God’s word as declared to the church, not to the world. This should not be construed to mean that God’s word has no relevance for the world or that the world is excused from receiving it or that the church has no duty to proclaim it to the world. It means that the Bible is the church’s book, and that the church has a duty regarding it. At 1 Tim. 3:15, Paul calls the church “the pillar and foundation of the truth.” He does not mean, of course, that the church is the author of the truth or the authority by which it is established. God did not give to the church or to its officers the power to rule the consciences of his people. Arguing from this text, Rome says that when her councils or Popes speak (as representatives or rulers of the church), then the doctrines which they dictate must be received as the oracles of God because the church is “the pillar and foundation of the truth,” and, therefore, cannot err. Protestants affirm that in this sense (i.e., as the author of truth and the authority by which it is established) God alone, speaking now only through the Bible (which is his inerrant, infallible inscripturated Word), is the sole foundation of the truth, and that the Bible is the sole authority from which we derive our doctrine and practice. What then does Paul mean by calling the church “the pillar and foundation of the truth”? He means that the revelation of the truth which God has made has been intrusted to the church, that the church is an institution designed and purposed by God to preserve the truth pure, to defend it against error, to preach it in the world, and to commit it unaltered and undiluted to future generations. As was true of Israel under the Old Covenant, so also of the church under the New Covenant, God has created a divinely ordered and regulated human society for the propagation and maintenance in the world of revealed truth. This, of course, makes the church indispensable–as indispensable as the pillar or foundation of a house. God never designed his truth to stand in the world without the church as its supporting pillar and foundation. For an elaboration of this point as it relates to Bible translation, see my Accuracy of Translation (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1989), 3.
The claims of Deists concerning the sufficiency of natural revelation notwithstanding.
On the point that the reality and testimony of natural revelation leads us to expect just such a revelatory word, see A. A. Hodge, The Confession of Faith (reprint ed., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1964), 29.
For our purpose, it is unnecessary to determine the precise meaning of the preposition ἐν in the expressions ἐν τοῖς προφήταις and ἐν υἱῷ. The point for which the Confession uses this text is made whether ἐν means “by” (KJV) or “in” (ASV). Owen suggests that we adopt the translation “in” because “the certainty of the revelation and presence of God with his word is intimated in the expression.” John Owen, An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1980), 3:20. Owen, however, does not follow his own lead consistently. See Ibid., 3:6.
The possessive pronoun “his,” given in italics in KJV, ASV, NKJV, is not present in the Greek text and should not be added, even in italics (cf., RSV).
Cited by W.H. Goold in Owen, Hebrews, 3:4, n. 1.
Compare the place of Mohammed in Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he is simply the last in a line of prophets; but there is nothing about his person that de facto would warrant a claim to finality.
Owen, Hebrews, 3:40. Owen prefaces these remarks with the statement: “We may see hence the absolute perfection of the revelation of the will of God by Christ and his apostles, as to every end and purpose whatever for which God ever did or ever will in this world reveal himself, or his mind and will.” In other words, we may say that the finality and completeness of the verbal revelation spoken in God’s Son may legitimately be deduced from its sufficiency to make men wise unto salvation and completely equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:15-17).
The aorist tense in the indicative is employed, here denoting completed action in past time.
John Brown, Hebrews (reprint ed., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1976), 20. Italics his. See also William Gouge, Commentary on Hebrews (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1980), 12; B.F. Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews (reprint ed., Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1980), 4.
The LXX translation of this expression is ἐπ᾿ ἐσχάτου τῶν ἡμερῶν (in some cases with minor variations), cf., Gen. 49:1; Num. 24:14; etc.
Owen, Hebrews, 3:33. Cf., John 4:25.
Waldron, 30.
Even the NT is not necessary in the absolute sense, as is evident from the multitudes converted as the result of the preaching of the Apostles years before any of them or their associates wrote the books which now comprise the NT Scriptures.
Commenting on 2 Pet. 1:19 (“we have also a more sure word of prophecy”), William Bridge, present at the Westminster Assembly, says, “More sure is the word written, than that voice of revelation; not ratione veritatis, not in regard of the truth uttered, for that voice was as true as any word in the Scripture; but more sure, ratione manifestationis, more certain, settled and established.” Bridge, 1:401.
Whatever may have been true before Moses wrote the Pentateuch, i.e., in God’s superintending the transmission of verbal revelation orally from generation to generation, we now live in a circumstance in which God has chosen to bind us to the written word.
Contrary to the pretensions of Rome, there is now no certain chain of oral tradition leading back to the original recipients of verbal revelation and no reason to believe that God is superintending such a process.
Turretin, 1:58.
Ibid., 1:57.
Geerhardus Vos, Biblical Theology (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1948), 5.
Ibid., 6.
By “epoch-making,” I mean that both the redemptive act and the accompanying revelation define a new epoch in the history of redemption.
This does not mean that there have been no subjective, individual redemptive acts that have impacted the entirety of God’s people. When God called Abraham, he was working redemptively for the good of all his people. When God saved me, that was not a central redemptive act. My redemption has great importance for me and may have some impact on others, but it is not even remotely in the same category as the call of Abraham or the conversion of Saul of Tarsus, who was to be the apostle to the gentiles and writer of at least thirteen NT epistles.
At Christ’s second coming, divine revelation will be universal (so that “every eye will see him,” Rev. 1:7) but even then we do not expect a verbal revelation which will add to the body of what the Scriptures call “the faith once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).
If a modern “prophet” arises with the message, “Thus says the Lord, I do not wish for anyone to go to hell,” what advance is made in the knowledge of God’s people beyond what the Lord has already recorded for our instruction in Ezek. 18:23, etc.? These kinds of “prophecies” abound in Charismatic circles, but they are not new revelations at all.
“Thus says the Lord, You shall not go to work tomorrow.” “Thus says the Lord, You shall buy a Ford and not a Chevrolet.” “Thus says the Lord, You shall marry Sally instead of Susie.” With our Bibles packed with principles by which we may make sound, God-honoring and God-blessed decisions, such “words of knowledge” are an insult not only to the intelligence of God’s people but also to the intelligence and wisdom of God.

Eamon Younis

Saturday 11 April 2020

The Second London Confession On The Doctrine Of Scripture (Part 1): An Exposition of Chapter 1, “Of the Holy Scriptures” (1.1)

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