Sola Scriptura?
Since my friend Levi has been asking questions about sola scriptura and church tradition lately, I thought that I would think out loud as I considered his thoughts. Really this is a question of revelation. How does God reveal Himself to us? How has God revealed Himself to us in the past? Well, this is a really difficult question. I think that it's important to notice that God reveals truth to us in many different ways. Here are a few of the ways.
First, God reveals Himself through creation. Psalm 19 proclaims that the heavens declare the glory of God. Theologians call this natural revelation. This, of course, is a most unfortunate name. There is nothing natural about it. It is truly supernatural. Last August I decided to spend more time outdoors this year to see what I could learn about God. Hurrah for Chadron State Park. Creation's beauty points to my Creator's beauty. This is why math, science, language, and the arts are important for the Christian to study. They, as a part of God's creation, teach us of what He is like.
Second, God reveals Himself throughHis Spirit. As we study natural revelation, we begin to notice how limited it is. For instance, what's God's name? Is He nice? I wonder if He needs me. Creation doesn't tell us that sort of thing. I first noticed this when I studied philosophy at CSC. Natural theology is very limited in telling us about God. Philosophers of religion spend most of their lives debating whether philosophical proofs for God's existence like the cosmological, teleological, and ontological arguments even work. We need more. We need special revelation.
This is where the Holy Spirit comes. The Spirit reveals truth to us that we wouldn't know otherwise. And as such, the Holy Spirit's revelation is quite superior to natural revelation. I think that might be what Paul was getting at in 1 Cor. 1-2. Wisdom, natural theology, is only helpful for so much. Information from the Spirit is needed to change a man's life. The Spirit uses several different means of revealing truth to us. He uses the Bible, as His God-breathed message. And He uses His church, a Spirit-filled community, to teach us about Himself.
The difficulty comes when we consider the relationship between the Bible and the church. This is difficult because the church doesn't always agree on the message of the Bible. I think that this might be where natural revelation comes back into the picture. Hermeuntics is the science of how to study the Bible. In being a science, it would be classified as natural revelation. Hermeuntics examines the nature of communication. This is helpful because the Bible is a communication between different individuals, a communication that God was carefully involved in. Literature often works in many standard ways. These needed to be study carefully within the church as natural revelation and then applied by the church to the study of Scripture.
Well, that's kinda where I'm at when it comes to the subject of revelation. Any thoughts?
First, God reveals Himself through creation. Psalm 19 proclaims that the heavens declare the glory of God. Theologians call this natural revelation. This, of course, is a most unfortunate name. There is nothing natural about it. It is truly supernatural. Last August I decided to spend more time outdoors this year to see what I could learn about God. Hurrah for Chadron State Park. Creation's beauty points to my Creator's beauty. This is why math, science, language, and the arts are important for the Christian to study. They, as a part of God's creation, teach us of what He is like.
Second, God reveals Himself throughHis Spirit. As we study natural revelation, we begin to notice how limited it is. For instance, what's God's name? Is He nice? I wonder if He needs me. Creation doesn't tell us that sort of thing. I first noticed this when I studied philosophy at CSC. Natural theology is very limited in telling us about God. Philosophers of religion spend most of their lives debating whether philosophical proofs for God's existence like the cosmological, teleological, and ontological arguments even work. We need more. We need special revelation.
This is where the Holy Spirit comes. The Spirit reveals truth to us that we wouldn't know otherwise. And as such, the Holy Spirit's revelation is quite superior to natural revelation. I think that might be what Paul was getting at in 1 Cor. 1-2. Wisdom, natural theology, is only helpful for so much. Information from the Spirit is needed to change a man's life. The Spirit uses several different means of revealing truth to us. He uses the Bible, as His God-breathed message. And He uses His church, a Spirit-filled community, to teach us about Himself.
The difficulty comes when we consider the relationship between the Bible and the church. This is difficult because the church doesn't always agree on the message of the Bible. I think that this might be where natural revelation comes back into the picture. Hermeuntics is the science of how to study the Bible. In being a science, it would be classified as natural revelation. Hermeuntics examines the nature of communication. This is helpful because the Bible is a communication between different individuals, a communication that God was carefully involved in. Literature often works in many standard ways. These needed to be study carefully within the church as natural revelation and then applied by the church to the study of Scripture.
Well, that's kinda where I'm at when it comes to the subject of revelation. Any thoughts?
posted by Daniel | 3:25 PM
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