Skip to main content

Inspiration and the Bible

We have moments when we feel inspired to do something, such as write an article or music, design an application, or somesuch. This kind of inspiration is far different than what is meant when Christians say the Bible is inspired. In that case, it is θεόπνευστος
theopneustos, which essentially means God-breathed. There is more to it than this.


Inspired is used to refer to Laura Ingalls Wilder or the Bible. There is obviously a big difference. We can examine the importance of biblical inspiration.
John Wycliffe reading his translation of the Bible to John of Gaunt, Ford Madox Brown, 1847
There are theological liberals and unbelievers who say that the Bible is inspired like other impressive human compositions, but is not all that special. They reject the inerrancy of Scripture, which leaves them in a world of hurt. After all, they cannot be consistent by rejecting creation, the Genesis Flood, miracles of Jesus, end-times prophecy, and other things — yet claiming that they trust in Christ for their eternal destiny! Atheists and other Bible-deniers seem to want to go to Hell, attempting to justify their suppression of truth by claiming that "the Bible is full of contradictions", but this pile of meadow muffins is easily shoveled away.

The different kind of inspiration between a Laura Ingalls Wilder or Riley B. King compared to the Bible is clear, but we still want to know what defines biblical inspiration. Some people think that God dictated it, as if he gave a whistle, told the author to sit down on yonder rock and write this stuff down. Not quite, since personalities and styles of various authors can be seen, but on occasion God did give a bit of dictation. There are other areas of consideration that may seem at first glance to threaten inerrancy and divine inspiration, but are actually items that need to be properly understood.
Most evangelical Christians would say the Bible is “inspired”. Yet if we scratch beneath the surface, most would be hard-pressed to explain, much less defend, the inspiration of Scripture. Many Christians only have a vague idea how we got from the original papyrus and parchment scrolls and letters to the leather-bound collection of documents we carry to church on Sundays.

Until relatively recently, this wasn’t a huge problem. But with the rise of Internet skepticism, anybody can copy a list of “100 Bible errors” and use it to assail their unsuspecting but well-meaning Christian ‘friends’. Thus, the average Christian needs to be more prepared to defend their faith. The good news is that the doctrine of inspiration is easy to explain, and with just a little effort you can confidently believe this important idea and easily defend it against the unsupported claims of unbelievers and skeptics when you are called to share your faith with them.
To read the rest, click on "The inspiration of Scripture comes in various forms".