Is the Bible Authoritative? Is Jesus the only way?

There's an old story about four blind men who were introduced to an elephant for the first time. None of them knew what an elephant looked like. "Ah!" the first one cried out as he grabbed the elephant by the trunk. "An elephant is like a giant and powerful snake!" "No, you are wrong," said the second blind man as he ran his hands over one of the elephants floppy ears. "The elephant is like a large, leafy plant." "No, you are both wrong," said the third blind man as he wrapped both arms around one of the elephant's legs. "The elephant is like a strong, sturdy tree." "All of you are wrong," said the fourth man. He was holding onto the elephant's tail. "The elephant is like a rope."

I tell this story to help you realize that people approach the Bible with the same confusion. 2. People approach the Bible with the same sort of confusion:

1) The Bible is the literal Word of God without error.

2) The Bible is the flawed product of men.

3) The Bible is both the Word of God and the product of men.

4) The Bible is the Word of God and the product of men, but it does have mistakes in it.

b. Like the blind men examining the elephant, each one of these statements embraces only part of the truth about the book we call the Bible.

1) The Bible is the Word of God.

2) The Bible is also the product of inspired men.

3) The Bibles we have today do contain some copyist errors and some seeming/apparent contradictions.

3. What is important is to see the whole picture--the entire elephant, so to speak.

a. The Bible is the Word of God given to us through inspired men.

b. Mistakes and seeming contradictions are there, but they can be corrected and/or explained.

c. The Bible, as it was originally written and received is totally and completely free from error. 

But then people say "Well with all the different translations, can I trust the Bible?"

A man went to a bookbinder to get a well-used New Testament rebound in leather. He wanted the side binding to read: “The New Testament”. When the job was finished, the binder explained that he just wasn’t able to get all the letters on the side, so he abbreviated: “TNT”.

Some people might like to think they can take some of the powder out of this dynamite, but it’s not possible to disarm God’s word. Comparing the Bible to TNT is appropriate; the author of Hebrews describes the Scriptures as a “double-edged sword” (4:12). The edge of our sword is not dull and cannot be made so by skepticism. Spiritual blindness keeps people from recognizing God in nature and in the revelation of His written word.

We live in an age where it is popular to question authority, and this extends to what God has said. Although for most of the past 2,000 years all branches of Christianity have agreed that the Bible is completely trustworthy, in recent times the validity of Scripture has been questioned by some. Can we trust our Bible? Can we trust its message?

We believe that the Bible is our basis for living. We base our decisions and set our priorities according to what is revealed in God’s word. To deny the divine origin of Scripture is to open the door to further unbelief—any or all teachings of the Bible could be tossed overboard if we do not accept the Bible as our authoritative word from God.

When Martin Luther was put on trial, he stated that he would gladly renounce his opinions if he could be shown where his views disagreed with Scripture. “Prove me wrong from the Bible, and I’ll gladly change,” he asserted. The Scriptures, not man-made rules or tradition, was Luther’s sole basis of authority. So he declared to the Council: “Here I stand! I can do nothing else!”

How to we respond to people who contend the Bible is full of errors and contradictions? Skeptics have over the years argued that there are discrepancies in Scripture, yet no one has ever come up with any firm evidence that might topple the basis of our faith. For every charge against the Bible there is a scholarly answer. There may be some difficult statements in Scripture, and we might not understand all we read. But when something appears inconsistent, we have to realize that the problem is with us, with our limited understanding. How we interpret the text may be what is keeping us from arriving at a satisfying answer. With time and study, we will be able to grasp what is being said in the pages of God’s word, and when we arrive in Heaven, all questions will be adequately answered to our satisfaction. The bottom line is that the Bible is a unified book and can be defended. People may hammer at an anvil, and their many hammers will break, but the anvil will remain.

Peter describes the process of inspiration, stating, “No prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (II Pet 1:21). The word “moved” could be translated “carried along”. The Bible is divine in origin; God superintended the production of Scripture. It’s not “creative writing” or inspired in the same way we think of people like Shakespeare, Mozart, or Rembrandt. Theirs was a gift of genius, but those who wrote the Bible were guided by the inward work of the Holy Spirit; they wrote in such a way that God got written exactly what He wanted. Because of its divine origin, the Bible (in the original languages) is completely trustworthy. There may be errors in translations, which is why it’s important to choose a reliable version, and then compare translations. 

As far as translations go, there isn’t a Bible translation that we, fallible humans, can point to and confidently identify as “the best.” It is of course possible to translate the Bible well, or to translate it poorly—just as with any other human activity. But for the most part, the Bible translations readily available to us today don’t differ as much in quality as they differ in translation philosophy. A translation philosophy isn’t a philosophy in the “Socrates, Descartes, and Confucius” sense of the word. Rather, the translation philosophy behind a particular Bible translation represents the way that the translators chose to answer the questions that must be answered when translating any text. And all Bibles fall into one of three categories: 

Word-for-word Bible translations, which emphasize faithfulness to the original text’s literal wording. A popular example is the English Standard Version.
Thought-for-thought Bible translations, which emphasize faithfulness to the original text’s intended meaning. A popular example is the Contemporary English Version.
Bible translations that mix the above two approaches. A popular example is the New International Version. 
I will tell you now, that the best Bible for anyone to get is the English Standard Version--as it is a word for word translation. 

However, aside from all this, The primary way that we United Methodist discern salvation is through understanding Scripture... and Scripture tells us that the way to salvation is through the atoning blood of Christ. In fact the UM official doctrinal statement is "The Holy Scripture containith all things necessary for salvation; so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." (p. 60 "Book of Discipline" (2000)

So Scripture contains what is necessary to believe in salvation, and the story of Scripture is the story about Jesus. It my friends, is not the story of Allah, or Gandi; nor is it the story of Buddha, or any other way, for that matter. It is, quite simply, the wonderful story of a God, made manifest in Jesus Christ!

Now that doesn’t mean that we beat up the Buddhist, or drag Muslim’s kicking to discipleship, but what it does mean is that "The Way" we teach is Jesus. And "The Truth" we preach is about Jesus and when we know the truth "the truth will set us free"...!

But, I know what you thinking...this leaves out a lot of people. True enough, so let's look at the exclusive claims of Christianity against that of world religions. The issue of exclusivity – is it truly a Christian only claim?

Christianity is not the only religious that claims exclusivity…

For the Muslim, one must believe in the Koran and know its Arabic language.

For the Buddhist, you must reject Hindu scriptures and the caste system.

For the Hindu, you must believe in karma (every cause has an effect), the authority of their scriptures (Vedas), and reincarnation.

For the Sikhist, you must reject both Hindu and Buddhist thought.

For the Baha’ist, which claims to embrace all religions, they exclude those who don’t agree.

For the Jew, you reject Jesus Christ.

Truth is in the eye of the person claiming the truth…

“If truth does not exclude, then no assertion of a truth claim is being made; it is just an opinion that is being stated…”

Jesus made many claims about truth…many of them recorded by John.

John 8:31-32 says “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

John 3:21 - “But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly what he has done through God.”

John 15:26 - “When the Counselor (HS) comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me.”

John 16:13 - “But when he, the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.

“The clear implications of Jesus saying he’s the way, the truth, and the life are that, first, truth is absolute, and second, truth is knowable.”

Christianity cannot be faulted for being the only religion that holds to its truth, but we can be faulted for claiming to know the truth, because the truth is absolute and knowable through Christ. No other religion can make the claim that they know absolute truth and that truth is easily knowable. Matter of fact, if you keep turning your back on the Gospel message, it will not matter how good we are, how good we've been, if we tell God he is not needed, He will be a gentleman and leave. Anytime we put what we think we know, ourselves, our knowledge, our good works, our opinions, our ideas ahead of the gospel message, then we are telling God, we don't need you, we don't need your grace or your mercy that can only be found through His Son Jesus Christ. As soon as we say that or even act like that by embracing false doctrines, our lives become about ourselves and not about Him.