There was an advertisement for a brokerage firm some years ago that said, “When E.F. Hutton speaks people listen.” In those television adds you would see and hear people walking about being busy with their live and a man would speak and everyone would stop and listen. In this way they were showing that E. F. Hutton was the authority on investments. This is how we often think of authority. We say someone is an authority who is an expert in the field. We say a referee is an authority because he enforces the rules of the game. But the Christian concept of authority is different from these views of authority. In both cases their authority is derived from something they represent.
The Christian is met with a superior and sovereign authority in the only true and living God who is the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And his authority is revealed to us in his expired or breathed out Word. God’s authority is revealed to us because it is given us in his Word. Therefore the Word of God is authoritative because it is God speaking to us. The Scriptures claim this authority in several repeated phrases in Scripture. “It is written” is used 46 times. “Scripture says” is used seven times. “According to the Scriptures” is used three times. And Jesus uses the phrase, “the law and the prophets” 38 times. In the words of Augustine, “What Scripture says, God says.” The Scriptures have their origin in the will of God and not the opinion or rational thinking of man. They have authority that man must submit to. Paul says to the Corinthian church, “What I am writing to you is the Lord’s command” (1Cor.14:37). So the writings of the prophets and apostles are the authoritative foundation stones of the church (Eph.2:20). The authority of the Lord Jesus Christ is given us in the Scriptures. When we say Jesus is our Lord then we must have a belief in and submission to the authority of the Scriptures. As one theologian says, “It (the authority which comes from the Bible) calls for instant and unqualified acceptance of every statement of the Bible on the part of man. To ignore, disregard, or reject any doctrine of the Bible is rebellion against God’s authority, and will not go unpunished.” (Edward W.A. Koehler) The authority of the Scriptures is found in the sovereign God who breathed them out. “The voice of Scripture is the voice of God.” (John Armstrong).
Let me illustrate this way. If a parent commands a child to do something and the child responds by saying, “Why must I do this?”, they are questioning the parents authority. If the parent responds by saying, “Because I said so”, then they have taken the supreme place of authority in the child’s life. The authority of the parent over the child is a derived and temporary authority. Therefore any authority the parent exercises over the child should point the child to their ultimate authority who is God who directs them through his Word. Therefore the proper response of the parent is not, “Because I said so”, but “Because God says so and you need to learn to trust and obey God.” God says, “Children obey your parents” and this is the final authority.
Therefore when Abraham repeatedly said to the rich man in Jesus’ story (Lk.16:19-31), “They have Moses and the prophets”, he was saying what Paul said about the weapons of our spiritual warfare. His and other Jews lives were set against the knowledge of God and his pleasure. Therefore they needed the sword of the Spirit (Eph.6:17) to demolish those strongholds, arguments and pretensions that were set up (2Cor.10:3-6) in that money promised a greater joy than God in Christ. And that walking over your neighbor to pursue that promise was greater than giving one’s neighbor the glory of God in Christ through love. But how does God through his Word take this place of authority in our lives. The kind of authority that is embraced, believed and loved?
The Scripture has a self testimony because it is God breathed and the Holy Spirit operates through that testimony in the life of Christian. Scripture itself bears witness to its own divine authority by the working power of the Holy Spirit. This is what is called the internal witness of the Spirit. The witness of the Spirit is not present in human emotions that cause you to choose God. The Spirit operates through the Word to believe, willfully embrace and act on God’s authoritative Word. This is what Paul says in 1Thessalonians 2:13, “13And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.” Notice in this passage that the internal witness of the Spirit is tied to the gospel. The believer must believe in the death of Jesus Christ as a satisfaction for sin and the resurrection of Jesus Christ as a justifying life. This must be the inner work of the Spirit that brings the witness of the Word to bear on the life of a true believer. If this is not present then the Word is not working authoritatively in the life. What the Scripture says, God says, and this authoritative Word of God working through the Spirit of God is what enables his church to submit to her Lord.
God has spoken and is speaking through his Word are you listening, trusting, submitting and obeying under his authority?
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