What is Biblical Inerrancy and Why is it Important?

One winter evening a few years back, I asked my wife, Brittany, what she wanted to do for dinner. She shared with me that she was planning to make Lasagna. I was thrilled with this news! We’d both been making a concerted effort to eat a healthier diet recently (This was a mutual decision, as we had both been feeling a little over-stuffed with cookies following the holiday season.), but the idea of a steaming hot slice of lasagna, dripping with marinara sauce, strings of melted mozzarella cheese chasing layers of noodle, ricotta, parmesan, and meat to my plate sounded delicious.

However, before I got too excited, Brittany warned me, “But just so you know, this recipe uses eggplant instead of noodles and replaces cheese with a tofu mixture...”

Now, if my wife is going to cook, I will gratefully eat! That said, as you might imagine, this further information put a damper on my excitement.

How many ingredients can a cook tweak, eliminate, or substitute before a food item no longer is what it was originally meant to be? I’m no culinary expert, but I do know this – there are just some lines where, once they’ve been crossed, the cook has reached a point of return!

The same principle is true when it comes to understanding the Christian faith. The infinite existence and eternal nature of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The complete deity and manhood of Jesus Christ. Jesus’ real death and bodily resurrection. These are among the essential doctrines of the Christian faith that cannot be adjusted or eliminated if the Faith is to remain what it truly is.

Another concept that is essential to Christianity is the doctrine of Inerrancy. This theological term simply describes how the Bible is true in all its teachings.

The Bible speaks of its truthfulness from early in the Old Testament through the words of Balaam in Numbers 23.

“God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?” - Numbers 23:19

Jesus Christ Himself affirmed this reality. Praying for the disciples in John 17:17, Jesus pleaded to God the Father, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.”

Jesus affirmed the truthfulness of scripture at the time of his temptation as well.

“It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” - Matthew 4:4 (Quoting Deuteronomy 8:3)

Jesus was confident in the truthfulness of the words of scripture, and His followers today can feel the same way.

Why? In the words of Theologian Dr. Don Fairbairn, “To state that Scripture is truthful is, at heart, to make a statement about God… If God is truthful, and if the Bible is his self-revelation to humanity, then it follows that the Bible is truthful.”

However, while followers of Christ can be supremely confident in the truthfulness of scripture, we must also regard our own ability to interpret it with humility. Scripture is completely true, but no human being is perfect in our understanding. Additionally, while all of scripture is true, some passages take some real digging to understand their context and meaning!

This is affirmed in the teachings of the Westminster Confession of Faith, a summative, historic statement of Christian truth. Chapter 1, Article 7 states that not all things in Scripture can be understood in a plain reading, but only those which are necessary to be known and believed for salvation, which is laid out that all people might be able to understand them.

Additionally, the Westminster Confession advises that those passages of Biblical truth that cannot be understood in a plain are best interpreted in light of the body of Biblical teaching, “When there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture… it must be searched and known by other places that speak more clearly.” (Article 9)

Therefore, followers of Jesus do well to form clear convictions around the beliefs about which scripture is most clear while also maintaining an attitude of humility and openness to learning from other believers who hold differing viewpoints on areas of scripture where the teaching is less clear. This helps believers to avoid division over issues that are not essential to the faith and this aids in furthering the mission of the church. (See John 17:20-21)

Scripture is an immeasurable gift to humanity for understanding how to know, follow, and worship God, as it communicates to us about who God is, how we can relate to Him, and what a life well-lived looks like in response to these realities. And ultimately, confidence in the truthfulness of scripture should lead to an experience of God’s transforming grace, which comes through faith in Jesus Christ, and then to growth in godliness and service God and others in response to His grace at work in our lives.

This is the trajectory of the Christian life, as revealed in scripture, and it will lead to the glory of God being made known in and through the lives of His people for all of eternity, according to God’s original intent in creating mankind and revelation of Himself in His word.