The concept of the inspiration of the Bible has been debated for centuries. For many Christians, it can be difficult to answer the question of whether the Bible is manmade, God-inspired, or both. If this is a difficult question for you, this article is the right place to be. We must get our information right in order to tell the truth of God’s Word correctly. We never want to be found guilty of spreading false information about God’s Word.
The Bible has been thought to have been manmade by many individuals across time. Atheists are normally those who believe the Bible is manmade, although many believers may believe this too. The Bible is not manmade. If the Bible were manmade, it would not be the true, inspired Word of God. Rather, it would only be a book made up by man. An example of a manmade religious text includes the cult of Scientology. Scientology was made up by science-fiction author L. Ron Hubbard. This belief system is false because it was made up by a man. There are no divine origins; however, the Bible is different.
The Bible tells us, “For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:21). As this Bible passage tells us, the Bible never had its origin in man’s mind. Instead, men wrote the Bible as they were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Thus, the Bible is not manmade but rather God-inspired. Every single word of the Bible is divinely inspired by God. There is not a passage that is written by mistake, nor is there anything in the Bible that is false. The Bible is one hundred percent true because it is the perfect Word of God.
In the same way, Paul tells us, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). This is another crucial passage of the Bible that informs us that the Bible is God-inspired. As Paul tells us, all Scripture is God-breathed. This means that every single piece of Scripture was inspired by God. None of the Bible was written by the mind of a man. Rather, the Bible was completely inspired by God. Since the Bible is God-breathed, we can know it is useful for everything we need in life.
Paul tells us that the Bible is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. In truth, this is everything we need to learn about God and teach others about Him. The Bible is unlike any other book in the world. While there are many helpful books, there is only one book written by God, which is the Bible. Many false religions and cults have their own sacred texts, yet none of their sacred texts are the actual true Word of God. Instead, their sacred texts are manmade and, therefore, are not true and cannot save and change the souls of man.
Since we know the Bible is God-inspired, we can have confidence in trusting every word of its beautiful pages. There are many different versions and translations of the Bible, yet they are all still God-inspired. When we look at the Bible and see how long it has persevered, we know it was kept safe by God. Everything written in the Bible is exactly what we need to hear, learn, and understand. If a person believes the notion that the Bible is just manmade, they are robbing the Bible of its true beauty. None of the Bible was written by the created idea of man. As each man wrote the Bible, he was divinely carried along by the Holy Spirit.
The words of the prophets, the words of the psalmists, and the words of the Apostles in their epistles are all divinely inspired by the Lord. Each time you read the Bible, reflect on the reality that it is the true Word of God. There are absolutely no mistakes in the Bible because it is God’s perfect Word. When we share this truth with others, we are bound to get hateful remarks, yet all we can do is control our own actions. Simply because others want to reject the divine nature of the Bible doesn’t mean that we have to too.
There are many individuals within Christianity who cut out portions of the Bible because they don’t preferably like them. Some of these sections might be on teachings of homosexuality or the rejection of God over a believer marrying an unbeliever. As human beings, it is easy to rationalize our sins and choose to cut out parts of the Bible because they don’t align with what we want. Instead, we choose to believe that these parts of the Bible are not inspired by God. We treat them as writings of man. This is a dangerous thing to do because it is as though we are picking and choosing what Bible passages we want to keep, and we reject those that we don’t.
Simply because a Bible passage offends us does not mean it was manmade. It is easy to take this belief because we can shrug this part of the Bible off as being “manmade.” This, then, can cause us to "rationalize" that what the author is writing about in this part of the Bible is not divine. Thus, if it isn’t divine, we don’t have to obey its teachings. Reflecting on this, I believe most of us can understand how this is dangerous and can cause many deep spiritual problems. Picking and choosing what we believe to be true will only cause sin to be more pronounced in our lives, and it will also cause our relationship with God to be impaired.
Even though some people may want to believe some of the parts of the Bible are not God-inspired, it simply isn’t true. All of the Bible is inspired by God. Each word, sentence, and passage is divinely inspired by the Creator of our souls. This means we can trust every part of the Bible because God doesn’t lie and cannot lie. Everything recorded in the Bible is the absolute truth. When we look at the Bible and read it, we are reading a true historical book that also obtains eternal information. History, archaeology, and science all support the unshakable timeline, and even miracles, of Scripture.
In addition to giving us an accurate representation of history, the Bible tells us what we must do to receive God’s free gift of salvation through believing in His Son and accepting Him as our Savior. The Bible also tells us about the future and what will happen throughout the Tribulation, the Thousand-year Reign of Christ, and the creation of the New Heaven and New Earth. Thus, the Bible is not manmade, but rather the Bible is God-inspired. It contains the true words of God, and it is the guidebook for our lives. We can learn more about God, grow in our relationship with Him, and obey Him better when we know the Bible is God-inspired.
Photo Credit: ©SWN