D.A. Carson
27 July 2019
In the history of the church this subject has been a huge dispute. The clarity of scripture. Is scripture clear enough for normal people to understand. Or do we need to be taught by the church?
The Roman Catholics said scripture cannot be understood by normal Christians and can only be interpreted by the church.
Today, the impact of post modernism has taught many people that the clarity of scripture is defective.
In classical hermeneutics approach the text straight in with a question and the text answers back to me. To get clarity is good hermeneutics. There has been seminaries in the past who did not leave room for historical context and said you just need hermeneutics.
Later, it’s discovered that when you ask a question you are already in a cultural location. How the question I ask may be different from the question an illiterate, who asks of the same question? Scripture in part is subject to who you are, based on race, education and culture which affects the interpretation and questions you ask.
But it gets more complicated than that. The lack of certainty. The lack of certain knowledge. Not 100% sure. And that is because scripture is not clear. Then I’m free to choose my own interpretation.
Some say you have your truth, I have my truth. It’s all very subjective. The problem is not listening to scripture but to bounce scripture off your own wants.
You have to bow both to the formal principle and the material principle. Not only the authority of the Bible but also how you interpret it.
You have to face the fact that the Bible is happy to talk about certainties.
Luke 1:1-4 (NIV)
1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.
The certainty of the things you have been taught. So why talk about the uncertainties?
1 John 5:13 (NIV)
I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.
This is a different kind of assurance and knowledge.
1. It is very important to avoid thinking that we can’t enjoy the certainty that God enjoys.
God knows everything. Yesterday, today or tomorrow. With certainty. You say the sun will rise at a certain time tomorrow but are you certain absolutely? The only person who knows 100% is God. If the only standard is knowing something is knowing 100% then we cannot know anything for certain. God cannot teach us everything. The communicable attributes of God is what God reveals to us. The incommunicable attributes of God is God’s.
Human knowing and human certainty is about not knowing everything. Like you know all the flights you’re taking at what time and what flight number but you probably have flown enough to know you cannot be certain. But if I ask you what time is your flight you can tell me with a certain certainty.
We are not omniscient. We cannot know everything with certainty. We can know with certainty of the image of God.
2. Experience show us that we can know something in part and to grow in knowledge.
It’s not a zero sum game. If you say you know Greek or Hebrew and you later realise after you think you know you can always delve deeper to know more. Learn the alphabets, then the secondary alphabets and then verbs and participles and you realise there’s still so much you don’t know. You’ll realise how much more you didn’t know about Greek.
If I ask you after you studied Greek, do you know Greek? You’ll say yes. Experience teaches us that we can learn some things and say I know some things but you also know there is much more you don’t know.
The same with reading scriptures. When a person first starts to read the Bible, you’ll realise he reads it differently from you. A Caucasian and an Asian will also probably read the Bible differently. We can know in degrees. And with a certain amount of human certainty.
3. There are models on how we learn.
I mentioned on hermeneutics and how we ask questions. When we talk of hermeneutical circle we go round and round and round and not straight in and out. But what if we go a spiral approach to knowledge. Where we move in circle yes, but we get closer and closer. Calculus is on approximation but the approximation is so good it works. The spiral method gets us closer to understanding.
4. It is very important to remind ourselves of some of the basis of our knowledge in scripture.
Luke 1:1-4 (NIV)
1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.
Luke proceeded by careful investigation. We would call it research.
Luke was in all the cities sometimes with Paul and sometimes without. He checked stories and read reports. He investigated. Only Luke looked at the narrative of Jesus’ birth from Mary’s perspective. He was a doctor so he may have more liberty.
Sometimes God delivers something. Like to Jeremiah the prophet. When God choose to reveal something we need to choose to believe that what God said is with certainty. Revelation with certainty. God is the one who claims to know what the future holds. Like in Isaiah 40 to 46.
1 John 5:13 (NIV)
I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.
We can know God because of the things God has revealed that we may know. Love test, truth test and the obedience (moral) test.
John 13:34-35 (NIV)
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
By this shall all men KNOW that you are my disciples. One of the things that demonstrate the fact that we are Christians is if we love one another. Certain people are followers of Jesus is that they expresses Christ’s love.
Knowledge is acquired by observing the behaviour of Christians.
5. It’s crucial to recognise that our minds are not blank discs, but meshed in our disobedience.
Our minds are lost in our own rebellion. The natural man do not understand the things of God because they are spiritually discerned. The Bible’s message of the gospel is so radically different from what the world knows that it just don’t make sense to the natural man. And Paul says it’s because we cannot know the truth as a natural man.
6. True human knowledge depends in part on what Paul calls the pattern of sound teaching.
Romans 6:17 (NIV)
But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted.
You learn a lot more truth when you understand the truth of sound teaching.
It does not mean if you’re a born again Christian you are smarter than a non Christian. The clarity of scripture is the doctrine that scripture is given with sufficient clarity for our salvation for this life and the life to come and to transform you to bring you closer to God.
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