Journal: Southern Baptist Journal of Theology
Volume: SBJT 26:2 (Summer 2022)
Article: Editorial: The Importance Of Biblical Authority For The Life And Health Of The Church
Author: Stephen J. Wellum

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Editorial: The Importance Of Biblical Authority For The Life And Health Of The Church

Stephen J. Wellum

Stephen J. Wellum is Professor of Christian Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and editor of Southern Baptist Journal of Theology. He received his PhD from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and he is the author of numerous essays and articles and the co-author with Peter Gentry of Kingdom through Covenant, 2nd edition (Crossway, 2012, 2018) and God’s Kingdom through God’s Covenants: A Concise Biblical Theology (Crossway, 2015); the co-editor of Progressive Covenantalism (B&H, 2016); the author of God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of the Person of Christ (Crossway, 2016) and Christ Alone—The Uniqueness of Jesus as Savior (Zondervan, 2017); and the co-author of Christ from Beginning to End: How the Full Story of Scripture Reveals the Full Glory of Christ (Zondervan, 2018); and the author of The Person of Christ: An Introduction (Crossway, 2021).

Historic Christianity has always affirmed that Scripture is authoritative because it is God’s Word written, the product of God’s sovereign action through the Word and by the Holy Spirit whereby human authors freely wrote exactly what God intended to be written and without error. Why has the church affirmed this view? What is meant by the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture? And why is this vitally important for the church to continue to affirm today?

The church has affirmed biblical authority because of Scripture’s self-attestation. When one evaluates a worldview, we must begin with the specific claims of that worldview. This is why if we are to evaluate Christianity we must begin with Scripture’s own testimony to itself. We do not confer on the

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Bible an authority alien to it; instead, we let Scripture speak for itself. And when we do, we discover that Scripture claims to be nothing less than God’s Word written and thus authoritative, sufficient, and reliable. For example, 2 Timothy 3:16 describes OT Scripture as “breathed out by God” (an allusion to creation, where God speaks the universe into being) and thus fully authoritative. So, in relation to Scripture, our triune Creator and Lord has spoken again and given us his Word through the agency of human authors (2 Pet 1:20–21). And it is precisely because he stands behind his Word—the God who plans and knows all things (Eph 1:11), who cannot lie and change his mind (Num 23:19;...