Word of Salvation – Vol.51 No.42 – November 2006

 

Scripture Alone and the Role of Tradition, Church and Reason

 

Sermon 2 of 3 by Rev M Geluk on 2 Timothy 3:16-17

Scripture Readings:  Isaiah 1:18-20; Matthew 15:1-9

Suggested Hymns:  BoW 122; 104-A; 214; 241

 

Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Last Sunday we first looked at this text: “All Scripture is God-breathed…”, and said that Scripture, therefore, is inspired by God, is without error, and is authoritative. Knowing that this is the nature of the Bible, we may confidently use the Bible “…for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

What are we to understand by the man of God being thoroughly equipped for every good work? Well, the Word of God equips the Christian believer by teaching him, rebuking him, correcting him, and training him in righteousness. We can trust the Bible to do this very well because it is ‘God-breathed’. God’s Word directs and guides the believer as he serves God in the work of His church and kingdom. In fact, in all areas of life, because there is nothing in life that is excluded from God’s influence.

As a Christian parent, as an office bearer, as a Christian teacher, yes, at whatever work you do, as well as in your relationships with other people, in your marriage, in any good work you do for the Lord, you let the Bible be for you all that it claims to be. But in “every good work” you do for God as a Christian believer, you are also influenced by other things, like tradition, the church, and reason. All these three have an influence on all of us. The question is: do tradition, the church and reason become more important to us than Scripture? Or can we see tradition, the church and reason as blessings from God which need not undermine Scripture at all? So how must we see these influences, how must we deal with them, and still hold on to the doctrine of ‘Scripture alone’?

1. The role of tradition

For centuries, and still so today, the Roman Catholic Church, has given church-sanctioned tradition the same authority as it gives Scripture. In their debates with the Reformers like Zwingli, Luther, Calvin and others, Roman Catholic clergy would appeal to the Bible and in the same breath, as it were, to what the church had said through its tradition. The Reformers would counter these claims by saying that tradition has its origin in man, and therefore, open to error and misunderstanding. It is Scripture alone that must be allowed to settle an issue, they said, for Scripture has its origin in God.

Today, as you may well know, Roman Catholic teaching holds that Mary not only remained a virgin after Jesus’ birth, but in 1854 Pope Pius IX declared that since Mary must be seen as the mother of God, she therefore had to be sinless when she herself was conceived. But if she was without sin, then she cannot be subject to death, for sin causes death, and so in 1950 Pope Pius XII declared that Mary had been taken up, body and soul, to heavenly glory. Now these two Roman Catholic teachings, the Immaculate Conception of Mary and the Assumption of Mary, have no basis in Scripture. The Church of Rome claims some Scriptural references but these are not convincing. Yet, the hierarchy in the Roman Church are not at all embarrassed because its teaching about Mary has come out of the tradition of the church and, in their eyes, this has equal authority with that of Scripture.

In Jesus’ time on earth the Pharisees also had their traditions to which they held on tenaciously. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus said a number of times, “You have heard that it was said…” (Mt 5:21,27) and then He went on to say what was said about God’s commandments. But what was said about the commandments had not come from God’s Word but from the Pharisees. Their application of God’s law had become their tradition and they gave it more weight than they did to the Word of God. The Lord would repeat what the Pharisees had made of Old Testament teaching but then He would add, “But I say to you…” (vss 22,28), and the Lord would say what God’s Word had really said. At another time the Lord said to the Pharisees, “Why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?” (Mt 15:3). And in other debates with the Pharisees, Jesus told them, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures…” (Mt 22:29).

So how must we see the role of tradition in connection with the ‘Scripture alone’ principle? At the outset we must always say that Scripture is above tradition. That has to be clear in our minds – Scripture is always above tradition. But before we say that tradition is bad and the quicker we ignore it the better we can move on, let us be clear on what tradition really is. Tradition can have both a positive and important role in the lives of both individual believers and the church as a whole – as long as it does not go against what the Bible says. Tradition is what we have inherited from the past, from those who lived before us. Tradition is the wisdom of their age, of their time. If a certain tradition has stood the test of time, then we ought to be sceptical about the wisdom of the present age whenever it departs from the ways of the past. There can be a rich heritage in the wisdom of the past and it is one reason why we ought to be slow and careful before we change our traditions.

For example, Proverbs 22:28 says, “Do not move an ancient boundary stone set up by your forefathers.” Let’s call that a fence. Proverbs is saying – don’t move a fence before you know why it was put there in the first place. What was the fence restraining? What was it keeping out? What was it keeping in? Someone had a reason for putting that fence there. Discover the reason for the fence, and whether it is still needed, before you tear it down, move it, or replace it.

We must look at tradition with Christian commonsense. In western society today a lot of things are changing rapidly and the result is not always good. Take physical punishment of children, for example. It is now banned from schools and even parents can be punished by law if the court decides your physical punishment of your child has gone too far. We know the Bible says, “Do not spare the rod” (Pr 10:13, 13:24, 14:3, 22:8, 22:15, 23:13-14, 26:3, 29:15). It’s not just one text. Proverbs alone has nine references to the rod of discipline.

We all know that the Bible’s idea of physical punishment does not mean assaulting the child or causing injury. It is to correct and discipline when words alone have no effect. Now our society no longer listens to what the Bible says. But a good case can be made that tradition will show that some form of physical punishment teaches children respect for authority. But this tradition has been thrown out and the result is a generation of children who run wild and don’t fear punishment because whatever punishment there is, it is not going to hurt them a great deal. The tradition of discipline is a common-grace blessing of God because it restrains evil, strengthens families, and helps educate children. There are many other good traditions and to throw them out is to act at your own peril.

Tradition in the church can help preserve orthodox teaching and orthodox practice. Take our Church Order. Unlike our Creeds and Confessions the Church Order is not a summary of the main teachings of Scripture. Church Order articles have been drawn up over a period of time in order to deal with issues the church has faced in the past. Now when similar issues arise today then you look at the Church Order and you learn how these issues can be dealt with and how to prevent related problems from happening. Godly people of the past have also faced these issues and with their collective wisdom and by seeking God’s help and guidance through His Word and Spirit they came to a solution. The Church Order is really a wonderful tradition that has been built up over many years and changes should only be made after careful deliberation.

The same applies to the church’s worship. The church has been worshipping God for thousands of years. We have liturgies and orders of worship from the second century AD. Christians back then just didn’t draw up these liturgies overnight. They had a close look at how the early church fathers described the life, the government and worship of the church. And these church fathers were the closest in time to Christ and the apostles, so what the church fathers did would have been influenced by the practices of the New Testament church. Now all this tradition that the church has inherited from the past does not have authority in itself, and it is certainly not equal to Scripture. Yet it is a witness of how the church in the past understood the Bible and how it had to serve and worship God. So why not look to the tradition of the church and find out why we do the things we do before throwing out the old and replacing it with something that has not yet been properly examined?

We are not like the cults, which claim that they have been the first to discover the truth. The truth has been with the church for a long time. God has also led the church of the past into His truth. Therefore we consult the past. We look at how Christians did things before us. Tradition, then, is a guide, a safeguard, a protecting of the best of the past from the whims of the present.

But what of the danger of traditionalism? Here, individual believers, or even a church, regard tradition as having as much, or even more, authority than Scripture. When that happens then tradition becomes a problem because people are no longer looking at tradition objectively. In the Middle Ages tradition had a stronger voice than the Bible and in the time of the Reformation the Reformers also had to battle against traditionalism. Traditionalism is often present when there is a demand for a lot of change. Sometimes the reasons for change do have substance, sometimes they don’t. Then the reaction can easily become: we have always done it this way. And all change is resisted. But consider, over many years a lot of change has taken place in the church. We no longer have the Gregorian chants. We no longer sing only full music notes. Women no longer wear hats. We have in the church electricity, air conditioning and other changes brought about by technology. And we still observe the teaching of ‘Scripture alone’. In other words, we must be careful not to let tradition have the last word. Tradition must not become superior to Scripture. But it would be foolish to go forward without the witness of the past.

2. The role of the Church

As with tradition, the church also does not have an authority of its own. But different to tradition the church does have some authority. Scripture describes the church as God’s household. The church is not just an organisation, it is the church of the living God, and as such it is “the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1 Tim 3:15). God has given His truth to His church to safeguard it and when the church does this properly, then we can look to what the church says as something to build on. The church is a foundation, a pillar.

Jesus gave authority not just to Peter but to all the apostles and hence to the church, but that means that the church must stick to the teaching of Jesus and the apostles. Jesus has given the church “the keys of the kingdom of heaven and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you lose on earth will be loosed in heaven” (Mt 16:19; 18:18). The keys are the preaching of the Word and Christian discipline. When the church does this according to God’s Word, then it can say to repentant and believing sinners that heaven is opened to them. The church can say to the unrepentant and unbelieving that heaven is shut to them. These declarations from a true church are as if God Himself is saying them.

This kind of authority also means that the church has been given the task of teaching and interpreting the Scriptures. What that implies is that an individual member of the church should not put his personal interpretation of the Bible above that of the church and then say, I don’t care what the church says. That’s how many of the sects have started. An individual claimed to see things in the Bible that no one else apparently saw. He or she then began to spread the new insights, got a following and the rest is history. That’s how Joseph Smith began the Mormons, Charles Russell the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mary Baker Eddy the Christian Science movement, and Willem Miller the beginning of the Seventh-Day Adventists. The beginning of the sects is quite different to the beginning of Lutheranism and Calvinism. Luther and Calvin had no intention of starting a separate movement. They carefully examined the Scriptures but they also read the early Christian church fathers. They tested their studies in debate and opened themselves to challenge. The Reformers themselves warned not to interpret the Bible in isolation.

The church is really the community of faith, within which biblical interpretation takes place. The ‘Scripture alone’ principle is not to be practised separate from the church and its history. That’s what a radical does. He rates his individual effort higher than that of others. He regards his personal judgment above the judgment of the church as a whole.

So when you want to honour the ‘Scripture alone’ teaching, then you are constantly checking your understanding of the Bible against the understanding of the whole church. You regularly try to make sense of the Bible within the boundaries of what the historic Christian faith understands the Bible to be saying. The Reformed Confessions are an excellent tool for this. Sometimes well meaning church members think that by appealing to the Confessions one is no longer adhering to the ‘Scripture alone’ principle. But this is a misunderstanding. The Confessions have woven the major teachings of the Bible together in order to teach the members of the church the heart of what the Bible is saying. And also to expose false teachings and incorrect interpretations of the Bible. The Confessions are not the work of one or two people. They represent the voice of many believers who realised the Reformation was a return to the Bible as the inspired, error-free, authoritative Word of the Lord. Hence we speak of a Reformed understanding of Scripture. And before any church member starts to say their personal interpretation is the correct one, they had better first test their insight against the understanding of the historic Christian faith.

So Christ has given the church some authority, and the church must all the time make sure it truly reflects the teachings of Christ and the apostles. But who in the church exercises that authority? As parents have authority in the home, so do the office bearers have authority in the church. They are responsible to properly exercise the authority given by Christ to the church. The ‘Scripture alone’ teaching means that the minister must preach and teach the Word of God in accordance with the historic Christian faith and not according to his own private interpretation. And when elders and deacons visit the members of the church as elders and deacons, then they must do so in the name of Christ and with the authority the church has from Christ. Home visits, for example, are times of sharing the Word of God, assisting the members to understand the Bible and role of the church properly, and encouraging the members to live godly lives. Home visits are much more than just a bit of social contact. And because home visits must remain important, members of the church must not refuse them, or keep on putting them off because something else has come up.

3. The role of reason

Reason is the thinking of the mind and for many centuries the Christian church knew no better than to always submit one’s reason to what the Bible taught. But then came the Enlightenment in the 18th century and it encouraged people to make use of their own understanding without the guidance of Scripture and church. We still hear today: make up your own mind, be an independent thinker. It’s really unscriptural. God wants us to always think His thoughts after Him. God is man’s Maker and we must never do our thinking apart from God. But with the Enlightenment people began to say that man had developed beyond the need for the Christian faith. Reason became the final arbiter. And when reason could not accept something then that something had to be thrown out.

The Enlightenment in the 18th century was the time, therefore, when men began to deny miracles because reason could not explain them. The supremacy of reason had bad consequences for the Christian church because faith in God and in His supernatural actions was no longer seen as being valid. The church still today is badly affected by leaders in the wider Christian church who subject the Bible to reason. The teaching ‘Scripture alone’ has for many been replaced by the ‘reason alone’ teaching. When reason is not made subject to God’s will and God’s revelation of Himself in Scripture, then doctrines like the Trinity, predestination, the two natures of Christ, divine and human, Christ as the Substitute, justification, the inspiration of Scripture, are all put in the trash can.

But because reason, like tradition and the church, can be misused, we must not and cannot do away with reason. Jesus has taught us to love God “with all your mind” (Mt 22:37). God told the prophet Isaiah to say to His covenant people, “Come, let us reason together…” (1:18). And the prophet was then made to say wonderful things about God forgiving sin. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool” (vs 19). Because God is full of grace and mercy, He is willing to take our sin, put them on Christ, have Him suffer and die instead of us, and God is thus able to forgive us. To God that is a reasonable thing to do and He wants us to understand how through Christ forgiveness is real and possible to all who repent and believe.

Reason is a gift from God. It sets humans apart from animals. God and the Bible cannot be understood without reason, without the thinking of the mind. As we read the Bible then we have to think things through. And the teachings of the Bible have to be mastered with our minds and then we need to work out what false teachings are saying and determine truth from error. Our historic Confessions are carefully reasoned documents. But as wonderful they are, they are not the final authority. The Bible is. Therefore we call Scripture our primary standard and the Confessions our subordinate standards.

Because the Bible is from the mouth of God, we want to go by the ‘Bible alone’ principle. So when we come across passages in the Bible that we cannot fully understand with our mind then we acknowledge that human reason has its limits. Hebrews 11 says, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed by God’s command, so that what is seen was not made by what is visible” (11:3). We can’t fully understand how God created things from nothing. Human reason cannot help us here. Hebrews 11 goes on to say, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to God must believe that He exists…” (vs 6). In other words, reason alone cannot bring us to an acceptance of God, which is why so many people say they are atheists or agnostics because they try with their minds to prove the existence of God. They cannot do it and so they say there is no God, the atheist position, or we just do not know if there is a God, the agnostic position.

We have looked, then, at how tradition, the church and reason, fit into the ‘sola Scriptura’, and we conclude that, used properly, tradition, the authority of the church, and reason, are given by God and do not at all threaten the ‘Scripture alone’ teaching. It’s only when tradition is put above Scripture, when the church assumes more authority than what God has given her, and when reason becomes the final arbiter, that the Bible is pushed out. Let us be thankful to God that still today the historic Christian faith recognises that the Bible is unique. Yes, that “All Scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

Amen.