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Lecture 4: Scope and Cohesiveness of the Bible
I. Moses, the Prophets and Paul all confirm the Agreement to that which is in the Bible
"So far we have looked at the Westminster Catechism with these six or so indications, sometimes called indicia, of traits which are in its own way validates itself in the minds and hearts of people. Its majesty, its purity and now we come by the consent of all of its parts. In other words, the Bible as diverse and big as it is with all of its different authors is an amazingly coherent story. There is nothing like this book, written across all those thousands of years by all those different authors and has a story line so amazingly coherent. You will not find any book like this anywhere in the world that is composed by so many writers across so many years, having one consistent redemptive historical story line that comes to consummation in Jesus and then working its way out into the world.
This is what they are trying to say; when you take the Bible as a whole, the impact that it makes on you; it would either lead you to believe or not to believe in it. It is saying that it leads you to belief by the amazing consent and agreement of all its parts. (Acts 10:43) ‘To him, all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.’ That way of talking is a testimony to the coherence and the unity of all that the prophets bear witness to and it is all centering on the Messiah and how he is going to bring about the forgiveness of sins. (Acts 26:22) To this day, I have had the help that comes from God and so I stand here testifying both to the small and great saying that nothing but the prophets and Moses said would come to pass. The Prophets and Moses saying what Paul is saying. So you have one part of Scripture with Moses and the Pentateuch, then another part of Scripture is the Prophets and another part of Scripture you have Paul, who says that they are all in agreement. (Acts 20:26) ‘Therefore, I testify to you today that I’m innocent of the blood of you for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole council of God. This implies that when Paul spent the two and half years in Ephesus, he delivered to them over time, a package called the whole council of God. In other words, there was coherence to it. There was wholeness to it and it related to the council of God. As he unpacked the Scriptures: Moses, the Prophets, and the Writings and how they were fulfilled in Jesus and the Way of salvation through Jesus; he was speaking in terms of a whole council of God. That is what Westminster divines and you see this when you read the Bible from cover to cover with a right heart. ‘Thanks be to God that you who were once slaves of sin,’ he is writing to the Romans, ‘have become obedient (Romans 6:17) from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed. That phrase, ‘standard of teaching’ is the same idea as the whole council of God. There is wholeness, coherence, and a standard of teaching that they were passing along as they read their Old Testament and fleshed it out in the New Testament."
https://www.biblicaltraining.org/library/scope_and_cohesiveness_of_the_bible/why-we-believe-our-bible/john-piper
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