Wednesday, April 8
Read John 1:14; John 2:22; John 8:31, 32; and John 17:17. Which parallels do you see between Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, and Scripture, the Written Word of God?
There is a parallel between the Word of God, who became flesh (i.e., Jesus Christ), and the Written Word of God (i.e., Scripture). Just as Jesus was supernaturally conceived by the Holy Spirit yet born of a woman, Holy Scripture is also of supernatural origin yet delivered through human beings.
Jesus Christ became a man in time and space. He lived during a specific time and at a specific place. Yet this fact did not nullify His divinity, nor did it make Jesus historically relative. He is the only Redeemer for all people, all over the world, throughout all time (see Acts 4:12). Likewise, God’s Written Word, the Bible, also was given at a specific time and in a particular culture. Just like Jesus Christ, the Bible is not time-conditioned, i.e., limited to a specific time and location; instead, it remains binding for all people, all over the world.
When God revealed Himself, He came down to the human level. Jesus’ human nature showed all the signs of human infirmities and the effects of some 4,000 years of degeneration. Yet, He was without sin. Similarly, the language of Scripture is human language, not some “perfect super-human” language that no one speaks or is able to understand. While any language has its limitations, the Creator of humankind, who is the Creator of human language, is perfectly capable of communicating His will to human beings in a trustworthy manner without misleading us.
Of course, every comparison has its limits. Jesus Christ and Holy Scripture are not identical. The Bible is not an incarnation of God. God is no book. God in Jesus Christ became human. We love the Bible because we worship the Savior proclaimed in its pages.
The Bible is a unique and inseparable divine-human union. Ellen G. White saw this clearly when she wrote: “The Bible, with its God-given truths expressed in the language of men, presents a union of the divine and the human. Such a union existed in the nature of Christ, who was the Son of God and the Son of man. Thus it is true of the Bible, as it was of Christ, that 'the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.’ John 1:14”. — Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 8.
Why must the Scripture be foundational to our faith? Without it, where would we be?
