faultyreasons

Some of my friend #Hamblin's twitter adventures into theology seldom do him any favours. Certainly the above tweet hardly marks him out as a Fundamentalist scholar, doctorate or not. He sometimes claims to have the DNA of #old time Fundamentalists. If so, then the above gives evidence of a defective gene. 

No Book has been attacked as much as the Bible. Of course, it will ultimately survive every last attack because it is the very word of God. However, from the human point of view, we need to maintain a vigorous defence of it, doing so with watertight arguments. The Westminster Confession of Faith (Ch 1:5) renders the following reasons on why the old Protestant Confessors believed the Bible to be inspired:

V. We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the Church to an high and reverent esteem of the Holy Scripture. And the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole (which is, to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of the only way of man's salvation, the many other incomparable excellencies, and the entire perfection thereof, are arguments whereby it does abundantly evidence itself to be the Word of God: yet notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof, is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and with the Word in our hearts.

These words, endorsed by the 1689 Baptist Confession, are a million miles away from #Hamblin's tweeted reason above, which is little more than a play on words. 

#Hamblin's tweeted reason above, however, is not just deficient but positively dangerous if taken seriously.  The Protestant Confessors of yesteryear gave us objective reasons to believe that the Bible is indeed the word of God. We bow to the Bible and the Spirit of God bearing witness by and with the word in our hearts. 

In #Hamblin's little theological ditty, the testimony of the Bible is seen to depend on #Hamblin's own INSPIRATION. This lifts our eyes away from the heavenliness of the Bible's matter and the efficacy of its doctrine etc., to the ramblings of a mere preacher. Bad enough if #Hamblin was a man mighty in the Scriptures. Even then, the cart would still be before the horse. But in #Hamblin's case, we are looking at a man more at home with a thesaurus or a rhyming dictionary than with a Bible. From time to time, I comment on some of Hamblin's attempted expositions of Scripture. At best, they are weak and yet we are being effectively asked to believe the Bible is given by inspiration as holy men of old were moved by the Holy Ghost on the basis that he is inspired to make them. I certainly wouldn't like to go into battle against a modernist over the authority of the Bible with bullets like this in my gun.

THE END 

* CALVINIST INDEX
* PROTESTANT INDEX
* CH SPURGEON INDEX
* EVANGELISM INDEX
* HERE AND THERE INDEX
* YOUTUBE VIDEO INDEX
* 3 MINUTE AUDIOBOO INDEX