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In Joshua 1:8, it says, “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth”. When Joshua 1:8 said that, it did not include itself. Because it would have been referring, presumably, to the Pentateuch. The Books of Moses.
In Psalm 119, when it says, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path,” it did not refer to itself. Because, Psalm 119, when it was written, was not yet in the canon of Scripture. It would have been a contemporary song, when it was written, much like contemporary Christian music today. Psalm 119 would have been like Hillsong Music, like Jesus Culture, in its day. So, it definitely was not referring to itself. With this great distance of time to us, Psalm 119 sounds like great, mysterious Holy Scripture. But when it was written, it was modern in its time. So, Psalm 119 clearly was not referring to itself, when it said, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet.” It would have been referring, presumably, to the Pentateuch, the Torah, maybe some prophetic books, by that time. I’m not entirely certain about the timing of when each book became part of the canon of Scripture, but suffice to say that Psalm 119 was not referring to itself as the Word of God.
When Ephesians 6 says, “Take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God”, it was not referring to itself. Because, when it was written, it was not part of the canon of Scripture. It was a contemporary letter, much like you’d see a popular minister writing a newsletter on the internet today. (Probably weightier than that, but you get what I mean.) So, when Ephesians 6 talks about the “word of God” being the “sword of the Spirit”, it was not talking about itself.
When the book of Revelation says, “And if anyone takes words away from this scroll of prophecy, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life and in the Holy City,” it was not talking about the 66 books of the Bible as we know it today (if you’re a Protestant). It was talking about itself – just the book of Revelation. When it says, “If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll,” it was not talking about the 66 books of the Bible as we know it today. It was talking about itself.
So, in that sense, the Bible never refers to itself, because the Bible did not exist while it was being written. While the Bible was being written, the 66 books of the Bible that we know today – that most Christians know today (some Christian groups do not have the exact same 66 books as the canon of Scripture) – the Bible that we know today did not yet exist. What I am saying is that the Bible never refers to itself as the Bible, because the 66 books were written over a span of thousands of years. It was not someone who sat down and said, “Hey I’m gonna write this huge volume.” Even Tolkien, with his seven books of The Lord of the Rings, took 14 years to write that. The Bible writers were not a committee, not an editorial committee. The Bible writers did not know that they were writing a Bible. They just wrote their individual books and letters and collection of poems. The Bible, as we know it, was curated by the early church somewhere in the 3rd century AD, which would be something like two centuries after the earliest known Gospels were written. So, when people say that the Bible is the Word of God – these same people usually say that the Bible is the highest authority of anything. And if that were the case, then there’s a circular logic here – that the Bible cannot be the Word of God unless the Bible says it is the Word of God, because the Bible is the highest authority.
The Bible never refers to itself as the Bible
But the Bible, as we’ve shown, never talks about itself – because it was not written as one book. I never think of the Bible as one book. I think of the Bible more like a bookshelf in a particular category in a library. It is a collection of 66 books that are remarkably harmonious in their message. But nevertheless, they are not 66 chapters of one book. They are a collection of 66 different books from different genres. So, the “Bible” never says that it is the Word of God, because the “Bible” is not one book.
The usage of the phrase “word of God” does refer to the canon of Scripture in their time, significantly. So, when Joshua 1:8 says, “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth,” it’s talking about the Scripture of its time. At the time Joshua 1:8 was written – and Joshua was a modern book during its time – it was referring to the ancient Scriptures, the Books of Moses. And when Psalm 119 was written as a contemporary piece of music, it was not referring to itself as the “word of God.” It was referring to the accepted Scripture of its time, which presumably would include the Torah, the books of Moses, and possibly some books of the prophets. When Paul wrote the letter to the churches of Galatia and he talked about the “word of God”, he was not talking about the New Testament – because the New Testament did not exist yet. He was talking about the Old Testament – the Torah, perhaps the Tanakh, as Saul would have known the Scriptures in his time.
Where am I getting with this? We, in our 21st century post-evangelical Christianity, believe and assume that the Bible is the Word of God, because within the pages of these 66 books, it does refer to the accepted Scriptures in different ages as the “word of God”. But the idea that these 66 books are the Scriptures only began about the third century AD – way after the 66 books themselves were written. So, we in our modern era till today, the 21st century, we look back in time upon these Scriptures that have been written over thousands of years in a few different ancient languages in various genres. And we see that in them there are references to the accepted Scriptures of their day being called the “word of God”, and we impute upon them our understanding of what the “word of God” is – the 66 books that are the accepted Scriptures of today (if you’re a Protestant Christian of the last half millennium). And we assume therefore, that the 66 books are the “word of God”.
The Bible (in one of its books) does reveal what the Word of God is
Why am I going on so strongly about this point? It is because within the Bible, in one of its books, it does say what the Word of God is. In John 1, it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And this, of course is referring to Christ. Christ is the Word of God. This is not a statement of law. Not a rational statement. It’s a spiritual statement and a mystical statement, that Christ could be a man and a God and the Word of God. It’s not something that can be parsed rationally, logically, intellectually. It’s a statement of mystery. But for millennia, people have been talking about a collection of written Scriptures being the “word of God”. First, the Pentateuch, then the Tanakh, then the Old and New Testaments have been called the “word of God”.
But through the revelation of the Spirit to the Apostle John, it was revealed that Christ the man, Christ the divine, is the Word of God. In other words, the “word of God” is no longer a collection of words, no longer words of Scripture written on scrolls and parchment and codices and specially invented Bible paper. It is the man Christ. The divine Christ. He is the Word of God. He is the revelation of who God is.
Christ himself said in his time, to the people of his time, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.”
I come from an evangelical background, where much emphasis is given on Scripture, on Bible study. And we really, really studied really hard. Because we believed that in them we find the answers to life, to death, to the universe and everything. We search the Scriptures because we’re trying to find life. We’re trying to discover the words of life. But Jesus said to “come to me that you may have life.”
Man shall not live by Bible study alone
The thing that we work so hard to try and discover by our sweat and effort, that we try to purchase with our study, he gives freely to all who come to him. And in that idea of coming to Christ, there is a mystery. I wonder how you “come to Christ”? If he were still physically walking here, you could just walk up to him – and probably, that’s what they could have done in that time. He was talking to them in physical form, “You refuse to come to me.” How would they have come to him? They could have just come to him probably like Nicodemus did at night. Probably say, “Hey, Jesus, can I have a word? Can we break bread together? Can we have a goblet of wine together? Could we go fishing together? Could we sit down in the temple and talk like you did when you were twelve?” And so, it’s not an intellectual pursuit. It is a relational thing.
Today, we come to Christ through the work of the Spirit of Christ. And so here we are talking about mystical things. Mysterious, spiritual things, experiential things. And some people get scared because they’re afraid that if you go and do mysterious, spiritual things, you might fly off the handle, you might go off on a tangent, you might get out of orbit and go up into space floating forever and ever like Sandra Bullock almost did in Gravity – and so, they cling to the written words, the words on parchment and scrolls and Bible paper. They cling to the Scriptures for safety, holding on for dear life. Just like Christ said, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life.”
We think – we think – we have life, but life does not come by thinking. Life comes by approaching the Christ by the Spirit and the Word. Today, Christ is not physically present on earth. How do we come to Christ? By his Spirit. And his Spirit lives in his people. The Holy Spirit does not float around over your shoulder somewhere. The Holy Spirit lives in whoever has received him into them. How do we come to Christ? First by the Spirit in ourselves and by the Spirit in one another. And of course, by the scriptures as well – for they record what has already been revealed to mankind. And by the circumstances that the Spirit leads us into, just like the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted – that is, tested – for 40 days. The Spirit also leads us into circumstances by which we come to Christ.
By the Word. By the Spirit. By the People. By the Circumstances of God, do we come to Christ. We come to know life and to know God, not in the Scriptures alone. The Scriptures are not the “Word of God” in the sense that has been revealed to us. Christ is the Word of God.
Let me end by saying this: You know that silly little game? What will you take with you if you could only take one thing and you were trapped on a desert island? Let me say to you that I would take my Bible. Actually, my first choice would be to take a satellite phone. But if you’re playing this silly little game and you have a silly little rule that you can’t take a satellite phone (because that’s what everyone would take) – if you do not allow me to take a satellite phone on this little desert island trip, I would take my Bible. Because there is no physical possession that I consider more valuable. Yet, it is not anywhere near as valuable as the relationship that I have with the incarnate Word of God, Jesus Christ; through the Spirit of God, who came into the world after Christ’s ascension out of the world and back into heaven.
Let me say to you that you do not find life by studying Scriptures, as important as that is. As important as biblical literacy is – way more than Shakespeare, way more than The Lord of the Rings, way more than How to Win Friends and Influence People. As important as biblical literacy is, you will not find life in it. You only find life by coming to Christ through a mysterious, (inconveniently?) mystical, spiritual experience. Through the Spirit of Christ, the People of Christ and Christ Himself – the Word of God – and the circumstances into which the Spirit brings you.
Alpha Lim
Mystic Preacher Man
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2017-04-20
Though we may know Him by a thousand names, He is one and the same to us all.
- Mahatma Gandhi
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Heb. 4:12 For the word of God is alive and exerts power and is sharper than any two-edged sword and pierces even to the dividing of soul and spirit, and of joints from the marrow, and is able to discern thoughts and intentions of the heart.