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sola scriptura or sola jesus?
Sola Scriptura is the rallying cry of the Protestant Reformation, but it never rang true for me. I was never a Lutheran or a Presbyterian. Forgive me, but I was raised Episcopalian–that middle way between Catholicism and Protestantism–and then went Ayn Randian for a while, then back to Jesus through the Jesus movement, shaped mainly by a Jewish believer who didn’t have a dog in the Catholic-Protestant fight, which was a Gentile brawl.
Sure, Scripture takes precedence over tradition. That’s what the Reformers were trying to reform. The church was subject to Scripture, not the other way round. But it is the best Sola to assert? Scripture never asserts Sola Scriptura. But Sola Jesus, Jesus only, that’s another thing–the book is replete with it. The Father has given complete authority to the Son, that’s what the book says. The Son is the last word, the living and the active one. According to the book.
Sola Jesus! It’s our heritage!
How about Sola Jesus? Isn’t about time we claimed our heritage as Jesus freaks? Sola Jesus!
Jesus is, according to John, the Word, the Logos. We mostly refer to the Bible as the Word, but the Bible refers to Jesus as the Word, “in the beginning was the word…”
Before the Bible is the Word, Jesus is, isn’t he?
But we must make room for Jesus coming into us in this fashion. We all know words can be like water on parched clay; they can evaporate before they penetrate.
Jesus saw the leaders of his day using the Scripture for their own purpose, which was religious mastery. And the Father who sent me has himself testified concerning me. You have never heard his voice nor seen his form, nor does his word dwell in you, for you do not believe the one he sent. You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you possess eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me. (John 5: 37-39)
Two Ways of Regarding Scripture
There are two very different approaches to Scripture. One is based on the assumption that God is far off, inaccessible, on a leave of absence. It’s the “Left Behind” approach to Scripture. This is what he left behind. It’s all we have, Scripture alone.
In which case we regard Scripture as though it were a painting of God, a graven image representing him in his absence. Everything ends with and depends on the ink on the page. We seek to master Scripture, and we defend the words of Scripture against attack, and we use the words of Scripture to establish our religious turf.
The distinguishing mark of this approach to Scripture is fear. Nervousness, a prickly bristling fear, a constant concern with heresy, repeated warnings that we’re slipping yet further down the slippery slope to ruin. As if Jesus were not around to do any leading, guiding, directing, saving.
Fundamentalism is fear-based religion and it tends toward the left behind view of Scripture. Jesus is gone. Scripture is here. Jesus is far off. Scripture is near.
No Fear! The Lord is Near!
But the Sola Jesus approach to Scripture is based on the nearness of the living Lord. The Lord, Jesus who walked among us, died for us, is now risen into a transformed bodily existence and is ascended into God space—the realm that is as close as our next breath, like a third dimension in flatland. The thinnest possible veil separating us….
In which case the words of Scripture are more like a tear in the thin veil, through which we feel the Lord’s breath. The words of Scripture are more like a window or a portal than a painting and we peer through the words to sense our Lord. Jesus alone.
Let me ask you a question. Would you kneel before Scripture?
Didn’t think so. You would, however, kneel before Jesus. And kneeling thus, Scripture would be magnified, because it would be his book. His to present. His to interpret.
Scripture would have found it’s proper place.
Sola Jesus. As when Moses and Elijah representing the Law and the Prophets (the Scripture referred to when the Scripture refers to Scripture) were with Jesus on that mountaintop. And Peter wanted to make a shelter for them all, and heaven frowned on his idea, and a cloud overshadowed them all, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son! Listen to him!” and when the cloud had lifted, there was Jesus only.
Tags: authority, Ayn Rand, Catholic, church, fear, fundamentalism, jesus freak, Jesus Movement, Lutheran, Mt. Tabor, Presbyterian, protestant, Protestant Reformation, sola jesus, sola scriptura
January 26th, 2009 at 7:35 am
רק ישוע
i feel the same way! raised in an independent baptist church as a young boy, i feel like we kind of got stuck in the baptism of John and never quite made it to the baptism of Jesus and His Spirit…(although admittedly, i never realized we weren’t supposed to believe in the power of the Spirit…i think that’s because when i would get bored with the sermon, i would open the bible and read joshua and judges and samuel and kings…lots of subversive stories of broken people being empowered by God’s Spirit…)
January 26th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
Sola Scriptura or Sola Jesus? I don’t think you can have one without the other. I think that those that are closest to Christ are also close to his book. And those that do not have access to the book, will risk there lives to find one.
“If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!” If the study of the scriptures turns you into judgmental hateful person, then it is obvious the Spirit of Christ has not been your teacher. If you claim to know Christ, and yet your lifestyle is opposite of one desiring purity and holiness, then you are serving another Jesus.
January 26th, 2009 at 10:29 pm
Nope, I wouldn’t bow to Scripture. But while the Bible doesn’t assert Sola Scriptura, it does assert that it is God-breathed, inerrant, infallible. It certainly leaves no room for beliefs or practices that are contradictory to Scripture. My feelings about Christ and how I should live in relationship to him and service to him must be consistent with Scripture. Often people who take a ‘me and Jesus’ approach to spiritually, not being grounded in Scripture, come up with a hodgepodge of beliefs that bear little resemblance to what we find in Scripture (I realize many who know the Bible quite well do this as well).
How would someone be about Sola Jesus without submitting to the authority of Scripture, which is his revelation of himself?
Maybe I’m missing something here…there’s been a lot of noise in the background as I’ve read and responded, so maybe I’m not thinking clearly. But the post has a tone of questioning the authority of Scripture to me.
Can you explain what the relationship between Sola Jesus and Scripture would be for Christians who don’t bow before Scripture?
January 28th, 2009 at 8:40 am
Ken, you asked me a question:
“Let me ask you a question. Would you kneel before Scripture?”
No, I wouldn’t.
“Didn’t think so. You would, however, kneel before Jesus.”
Sorry, Ken, no can do. I would not kneel before any human being, whether man, woman or child, living or dead, unless irresistably forced against my will to do so. And neither should you.
Just my honest opinion.
January 28th, 2009 at 11:31 am
brian, thanks for the patience and understanding–I’m actually after a higher view of Scripture and one that is more scriptural, rooted in Jesus as the living and active Lord. No time for more right now, but I’ll be back to this.
January 28th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
What would I bow to? We bow when we lower ourselves to help those in need. I bowed to my wife when I asked her to marry me. I have fallen to my knees in brokenness and cried for mercy. We bow our hearts in humility every time we are kissed with the presence of Jesus. And at times, I have bowed before the scriptures and worshipped the living word that still breaths life when I read it. When we have been touched by his grace and mercy, bowing is not an issue. We don’t bow to the letter, we bow to the Author.
January 28th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
Regarding the scriptures, in the original languages, “God-breathed” doesn’t necessarily mean inerrant or infallible. Adam and Eve were “God-breathed” too, and unfortunately for us, they turned out to be quite errant and fallible.
Ken, on your churches website it says:
“We believe the Bible to be a living Word, comprised of the God-breathed voices of many who have come before us, and trustworthy for revealing God and his ways. Our spirituality is to be biblical because the Bible is the story of Jesus.”
http://www.annarborvineyard.org/who_we_are.cfm
Neither “God-breathed” nor “trustworthy” necessarily means inerrant or infallible. Therefore, there is no insistence at Ann Arbor Vineyard that the Bible is inerrant or infallible. Am I correct or mistaken about that, Ken?
January 29th, 2009 at 5:19 am
Yes-yes-yes-yes. Jesus is ALIVE! Jesus asks us to seek his Holy Spirit in order that we may find God and know him. Why would we ever shove the living God aside in preference for a book, however informative, inspired, and full of God’s own action in history.
January 30th, 2009 at 1:16 am
I think a spiritual life is oriented towards devotion to the Presence of Jesus, not the Bible. Below I have paraphrased a Buddhist wisdom story:
“Suppose a man were traveling along a path. He sees a great river, and the Land on the further shore is beautiful, fertile and peaceful, but there is no ferryboat going from this shore to the other. The thought occurs to him, ‘I will gather grass, twigs, branches, and leaves, and bind them together to make a raft, and cross over to the Other Shore.’
So the man made a raft. He crossed over safely to the other shore. Upon reaching the Further Shore, he might think, ‘How useful this raft has been to me! Why don’t I keep it and carry it on my back while travelling on this New Land?’ What do you think: Would the man, in doing that, be doing what should be done with the raft?” ["No."] In the same way, I have taught the Scriptures as compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Understanding the Scriptures as compared to a raft, you should let go even of Scriptures, to say nothing of non-Scriptures, and continue on your journey into the Peaceful New Land [the Jesus Presence].”
January 30th, 2009 at 7:15 am
“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie – deliberate, contrived, and dishonest, but the myth – persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
-John F. Kennedy
January 30th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
Well this has certainly gotten a wide range of responses, hasn’t it? Archie, God-breathed is the most scriptural of the words used to by Scripture to describe Scripture. “All Scripture is inspired, and profitable for….” said Paul. The words “inerrant” and “infallible” are not Scriptural words to describe Scripture, but depending on what you mean, I’d not object to them. The inerrancy of Scripture doctrine that I have heard articulated posits that the Scriptures are inerrant “in their original manuscripts” which no one, of course, has access to. So I’ve never had that particular doctrine of Scripture explained to me in a way that resolves my questions. For example Scripture seems to indicate that the sun revolves around the earth. This is what the biblical writers believed and it is reflected in the Bible. Is that in error from a scientific point of view? Yes. Is it germane to Scriptures veracity, inspiration or reliability in matters of faith and practice? No.
My post on sola scriptura, however was tackling a different concern: the use of the term “only” in relation to Scripture, when it seems that Scripture itself reserves the sola for Jesus and that Jesus himself in Scripture warns against an approach to Scripture that seems to be very vigorous and faithful, but in fact, is a kind of religious mastery, rather than submission to him. As N.T. Wright indicates in his book, The Last Word, the real issue is the authority of God.
It’s my modest and perhaps mistaken thesis that when the emphasis is truly SCriptural, it is Sola Jesus, and when Jesus is central and magnified, all else, including Scripture is elevated as well, but in proper relationship to him. Scripture becomes a means by which we come into contact with the living Lord rather an end in itself, a mere graven image.
Obviously, I’m using provocative language to get at something which I discern to amiss in the standard evangelical approach to Scripture. But it’s a concern rooted in the desire to be faithful to Jesus revealed in Scripture.
January 31st, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Ken,
So which meanings of ‘inerrant’ and ‘infallible’ would you not object to? Which meanings of those words would you object to?
And since you point out that no one has access to ‘the original manuscripts’– what is your response to Archie’s question? Is there no insistence at the Ann Arbor Vineyard that the Bible is inerrant and infallible?
January 31st, 2009 at 9:08 pm
Brian, RE your question about insistence at A2VC re Bible, here’s what we include in our member class:
Assumptions about the Bible
“I will simply state my assumptions about the Bible: On its human side, I assume that it was produced and preserved by competent human beings who were at least as intelligent and devout as we are today. I assume that they were quite capable of presenting what they heard and experienced in the language of their historical community, which we can understand with due diligence.
On the divine side, I assume that God has been willing and competent to arrange for the Bible, including its record of Jesus, to emerge and be preserved in ways that will secure his purposes for it among human beings worldwide. Those who actually believe in God will be untroubled by this. I assume that he did not and would not leave his message to humankind in a form that can only be understood by a handful of late-twentieth-century professional scholars, who cannot even agree among themselves on theories that they assume to determine what the message is.
The Bible is, after all, God’s gift to the world through his Church, not to the scholars. It comes through the life of his people and nourishes that life. Its purpose is practical, not academic. An intelligent, careful, intensive but straightforward reading…is what it requires to direct us into life in God’s kingdom. Any other approach to the Bible, I believe, conflicts with the picture of God that, all agree, emerges from Jesus and his tradition.”
From The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard, Harper, San Francisco, c. 1998 pp xvi-xvii. Willard is a theologian and scholar. He is professor at the University of Southern California’s School of Philosophy.
So we preach and teach from the bible, pray with the bible, do our best to obey God as he speaks to us in the Bible, but don’t use inerrancy doctrine
as the thing we insist because I think it means many different things to different people. When I’ve used that kind of language, I prefer infallible to inerrant because it’s usually in the context of “infallible in matters of faith and practice” which I prefer.
February 1st, 2009 at 6:32 pm
Thanks Ken. Appreciate you taking the time to respond to the questions.
February 3rd, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Great topic !
As I understand it, there is definitely the need for scripture, since most of what we know of Jesus is contained therein. Wouldn’t ‘Sola Scriptura’ mean that what we know of Jesus sourced exclusively from the biblical canon?
To seek Jesus without the Bible would create a Jesus that is after our own image, no?
This is especially important to me because as some of you may know, I am not one to ‘feel’ Jesus or the Holy Spirit in any strong or clear way, so without the Bible to guide me in following Jesus, I fear I would go off in some fantasy land.
I envy some people who seem to feel led by Jesus to do this or that, to marry him or her, etc. I can only suppose Jesus’s leading in my life through hindsight.
As far as my experience, I am limited to reading scripture’s depictions of Jesus and apply those experiences to my current life issues.
So in a way, I do sort of ‘bow’ to scripture, if only as a map to follow the real Jesus.
February 3rd, 2009 at 7:57 pm
Joao, Yes, but your reason for going to Scripture is to know Jesus. This is the problem with even bringing up this topic. One gets wedged into a corner where one is tempted to argue against the value of Scripture. No can do. Jesus loved this book and so must we, even, maybe even especially, when it annoys us. But the Scripture itself is not the end. It is not a painting of God; it is a window through which we see him. As soon as our aim becomes Scripture, rather than Jesus, we distort the Scriptural meaning of Scripture, which is to reveal Jesus. And Jaoa, you are only one member of the body of Christ. Your experience is not the only experience [and of course you are not claiming it is--just the opposite in fact] so it would not be wise to formulate an understanding of Scripture that was based on what has been your experience thus far. Your experience highlights the necessity of Scripture. There are people who can feel Jesus, but when they read the Bible it’s like water off a duck’s back. We don’t want that their experience to determine our view of the Bible either. I’m simply making perhaps the point that is obvious to everyone but me: that the Jesus revealed in Scripture claims that jesus HIMSELF is the source of all authority.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:49 am
Ken, your quote from Dallas Willard’s book is about assumptions. At least you are being honest with us by admitting that A2VC includes a discussion of assumptions in its member classes.
Willard’s entire quote is incredible to me, i.e., it is without credibility. “All agree”? “ALL AGREE”? There are MANY truth-seeking Christ-believing theologians and scholars of integrity who disagree with him! His quote is a biased apologetic! I thought we were trying to seek Truth here, wherever it leads us, whatever the cost!
Here’s a better quote to chew on:
“God’s loving, compassionate word to us consists entirely and completely of all that is true. All Truth is God’s Word.” -Archie
“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things.” -Paul [Phil 4:8]
February 4th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
Ken- You said: “Jesus loved this book.” I am not going to argue Jesus’s love for the entire new testament, but can that claim be made about text that wasn’t even in the Book that Jesus shows appreciation for and recurring usage as written in the Gospels? That would be like someone in 2310 saying that I loved the Bible which now includes letters that you wrote to the Church of Ann Arbor or possibly sermons that got appended. No? This doesn’t disprove Jesus’s love for the new testament text nor am I questioning its relevance in the growth and advancement of Christian thought and practice.
This coincides with a growing tension within when people use Paul’s teaching about the bible being a sword and then using Paul’s words as part of that sword when Paul didn’t view his letter to particular churches as “Scripture” (Eph. 6:27: http://www.ibsstl.org/bible/verse/?q=Ephesians%206:17&niv=yes). This may more have to do with people interchangeably using the term Scripture and God’s Word. Just some thoughts……
February 4th, 2009 at 8:09 pm
Phil, Yes, we often forget that when Jesus referred to Scripture he was referring to the Hebrew Scriptures of his day.
.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
Archie, I think you’re being a little tough on Dallas. As I read the quote again it seemed to me that he was simply stating his assumptions about the Bible as his assumptions (“I assume” being the operative phrase.) That “all agree” that you point out, doesn’t apply to the whole of what he is saying, I don’t think. That is, I don’t think he is trying to say that “all agree” with his assumptions. After reading the “all agree” sentence a few times, I’m not sure what he’s saying all agree with. “All agree” admittedly is a pretty tough statement to defend when used about practically anything. You may have caught the good philosophy professor in a little slip there.
February 5th, 2009 at 3:21 am
Ken, I didn’t mean to imply that Dallas was claiming that “all agree” applied to the whole of what he was saying, and I should have made that non-implication clearer in my comment. Meanwhile, regarding the topic of “assumptions”:
assume: -verb
to take for granted or without proof; suppose; postulate; posit; presume.
to suppose to be true or real for the sake of argument or explanation.
to believe, especially on uncertain or tentative grounds.
to consider to be probable or likely.
to imagine; conjecture.
“The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.” – Elie Wiesel
“The opposite of the love of Truth is not the hatred of Truth, but the indifference toward Truth that is revealed in the willing acceptance of assumptions about Truth. The opposite of the love of Truth is the assumption of Truth.” – Archie
February 5th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
I have learned that my opinions about the Bible are only appreciated by myself alone. This pretty much goes along with my politics and religion in general.
I’m experiencing a week filled with gratitude. What I do want to say is that I am very grateful for the Vineyard of Ann Arbor. This church has helped me grow as a Christian, mainly through the way people are so interested in seeking….seeking whatever God has called them to seek. The feeling makes me want to join in, to be a joiner, and learn more. I have absolutly no desire to read the Bible on my own. To Meditate on Scripture is to sleep! When I read scripture I pretty much understand the message, when I Meditate on scripture I get bored because the message seems so apparent and easy to understand, to the point that I don’t understand the point of meditating.
So I live my life in a way that I hope makes Jesus happy. And this place makes me want to do better and learn more. The dialog and openness to discussion at our church has awakened a part of my spiritual brain that was asleep in churches that fear dialog, discourage it, make it feel ashamed….I learn from discussion more than I learn from scripture.
I was up late the other night, took a walk at 2AM, and thanked God for all that makes this life good. I hope I can become less of a complainer, being grateful feels better.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
No need to ask forgiveness for being raised an Episcopalian; it’s an honorable tradition.
February 22nd, 2009 at 8:00 am
This article is very thought provoking. I am reminded that Jesus called the bluff of the Pharisees by pointing out that they study scriptures because they think that in them they can find eternal life … and the scriptures point to Jesus, but they are not willing to come to him.
Don’t we do the same thing? For many years, I read the bible and agreed intellectually with what was written, but it was not until I actually made a decision to take my eyes off the pages and follow Jesus in a very real, live and interactive way that I understood what he meant when he said “..and yet you are not willing to come to me”. We don’t follow Jesus through a book – we follow Jesus through our hearts. The bible instead challenges and re-adjusts our hearts so that we can find Jesus in the first place. The ball is then left in our court to actually “go to him”.
Peace & Love
March 13th, 2009 at 10:56 am
I got struck by some thoughts that are (hopefully) relevant while picking up some control flags in the woods after a race last Saturday. I was tired, was fretting about some work relationships, it was raining and eventually thunderstorming. I kept taking bearings on my compass with the map and ended up not quite where the flags in the woods were (accurately) placed. I was distracted by the poor visibility, shoes that came untied, needed to go around huge piles of deadfall, etc., etc.
It struck me that I do believe in biblical inerrancy just as a I trust a good compass and topographical map out in the woods. When I “miss the mark” it’s because of my own humanity and imperfection. The bible is just fine but I need the help of Jesus and his family to keep heading in the right direction. Like land navigation lots of practice helps too.
March 13th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
Great post! Being raised Baptist, I, too, was also taught bibliolatry – that God is most present to us in the Bible. So it is refreshing to hear that others are making the same observation that Jesus himself made — that eternal life isn’t found in the scriptures, but in a Person.
It’s ironic that for Christians who claim “sola scriptura”, they can’t even find the words “inerrant”, “infallible”, or “the sole rule for faith and practice” in their own Bibles.
The best literal claim the Paul makes, and it is only about the Old Testament (2 Tim 3:16) is that the scriptures are profitable to prepare us for good works.
It’s my opinion that the scriptures are, generally and metaphorically speaking, a finger pointing to Jesus. But, somehow, most Christians are more interested in the finger and who understands the finger the best.
Thanks for the food for thought.
March 20th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
I think sola scriptura has many things going for it if you want to look for common ground and warrants. I also believe that sola Jesus more or less requires one accepts the authority of at least the Old Testament [more or less known at the time, and quoted liberally by Jesus.]
I think the problem is not with sola scriptura. The problem is that there are a lot of people who claim they are sola scriptura when they are really “Sola Paul and John.”
The truth is the vast majority of those who trumpet sola scriptura pillage scripture to get what they desire (either to affirm their own dogma or settle their own psychological needs). They don’t really allow all of scripture to inform their understanding, and they do not allow the context of the scripture to inform its meaning. [Two separate pitfalls, each severe.]
For example, it’s common to look at the prophecies in Isaiah to Malachi and poach from them the passages that identify Jesus as the Christ. There’s noting wrong with that, of course, but the same people seem to ignore the far more rampant discussion of why the Messiah was needed and what the Messiah was going to accomplish.
Similarly, people will gladly take Mark 9:48 to support a certain understanding of hell and ignore completely the ramifications of the attendant verses on their own eschatology/soteriology (why on earth, in the reformed mindset, is Christ suggesting that someone’s future sin can bring them into danger of hell, while presumably suggesting they are not completely consigned to it already (for past sin)?)
People gather “the gospel” from writings that Paul wrote to address specific concerns within the churches of people who were already Christians. Wouldn’t a more logical place to find “the gospel” be in the general evangelism shown in Acts…or perhaps in the “gospels” themselves? In my book I challenge people to read the entire gospel of Mark and ask themselves “What message was Mark trying to get across to people who may not have had any other NT writing?”
You might think a lot of things after reading all of Mark, but “I need to go tell others about Jesus _or else they will go to hell_” is not one of them. (so long as you assume Mark ends at 16:8.)