We have, no doubt, all heard that the Bible is the word of God. It is God's Book given to man to serve as the User Manual for our temporal existence. However, some other books also claim to be God's word - even going to the extent of saying that God either personally (or through an angel) wrote such a book (e.g. the Book of Mormons) or that God dictated the contents of an "original" copy in heaven to the human writer (e.g. the Qu'ran).

One of the purposes of this article is to declare emphatically that the Bible has nothing to do with such ideas. There is no Bible in heaven. (And it is not necessary for it to be there since Jesus Christ, the eternal Word Himself, who the Bible points to, is already there. It is true that a few portions of the Bible were actually dictated by God and written down verbatim by the human writers - but these are very few indeed, and were so rendered by God for specific and special reasons. Such portions are always clearly stated by the writer.

On the contrary, when we declare that the Bible is the word of God we mean, firstly, that it is the sole written document which God has appended His name to - i.e. it is the Scriptures, and secondly, that its means of coming to man is by inspiration of God.

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.2 Timothy 3:16

With respect to the Bible, God chose certain men according to His wisdom, and inspired them to "know" the precise information that He, God, wanted to put in the Scriptures (called prophecy). Thereafter, He also caused them to write the information down without error.

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.
2 Peter 1:20-21

We note from the above verses that those who God chose to inspire were deemed "holy" (which means consecrated / separated unto God) and were privileged to receive the special information which they wrote down. Only God Himself knows what "qualified" these men for such honour that they may be called holy - but we know that no man can qualify for anything before God by his personal merit. It is always by the grace of God.

So, it was that God chose about forty men from numerous locations over a period of some 1,500 years to receive by inspiration and write down what He wanted to put in the Scriptures.

Only the information (message) is inspired

At this point, we must address our attention to a popular misunderstanding of people about the Scriptures. Contrary to common belief, only the information of the language is inspired, not the literary competence of the human writers. An inspired primary school child writing in the English language will not suddenly begin to write impeccable Queen's English; neither will he miraculously acquire the skills of a WS (whether this means William Shakespeare or Wole Soyinka is quite irrelevant) The boy will only write at his level as a primary school pupil.

Of course, we are not insinuating that God never "touches" the skills of His chosen vessels (He often does!) only that such a touch is another issue entirely different from, and secondary to the inspiration to write the Scripture. Therefore, it is very wrong to use the literary skills of a chosen vessel as a yardstick to measure the authenticity of inspiration.

The same Holy Spirit who inspired Paul to write such that his highly learned readers acknowledged his great skills, is the same Holy Spirit who inspired Peter and John to speak the divine words recorded in Acts chapter 4. Their level of delivery was so exalted that the Sanhedrin members could not but marvel at the wonder that unfolded before their very eyes because they knew that Peter and John were neducated and untrained. I can only imagine the bewilderment of these pompous scholars listening to the two stark illiterate fishermen in undignified attires preaching with boldness and accuracy the deep things of life and eternity - and doing it in their unpolished koine (i.e pidgin) Greek! My dear reader, that's inspiration for you!

Revelation

The question may be asked, "Where does revelation come in?" Why are the religions based on the Bible (Christianity and Judaism) referred to as revealed religions? All such questions are due to lack of a basic understanding of spiritual terms, which we shall now attempt to resolve.

Revelation simply means to "show" or to "make known". In the context of our current topic, it refers to the nature and content of the inspiration. Put explicitly, inspiration is the means, revelation is the product. Revelation is not defined by a mystical nature of the revealed thing, but by the fact that it is revealed and that the Person doing the revealing is God. So the message does not have to be mysterious at all. All that is necessary is that an inspired person receives knowledge by immediate impartation rather than by mediate efforts at deduction.

Such knowledge may even be about things already known or a "mere" noting (and documentation) of supposedly general knowledge. For example, all the so-called historical books of the Bible were about things of public knowledge - yet God inspired His servants to know to write them down. What is thus written is revelation of God. The revelation is the God-given knowledge of exactly "what to write" out of all possible things and occurrences, as well as the spiritual truth that God Himself makes known through the writing of what men thought was ordinary "story". The apostle Luke dutifully wrote down all that he was inspired to write of what he saw as the early believers were living out their lives. It was a kind of diary / journal, but it was God who was directing everything being penned! How would the practice of Christianity have been today if not for such revelations as the book we now call "The Acts of the Apostles"?.

Conclusion

Are you a Christian? If so, may I just exhort you that as you continue in your walk with the Lord, by studying His word, do not permit occasional literary weaknesses of the human writers to distract you from the eternal truth of the God's word. And certainly, do not at all be swayed by the attempts of unbelievers who try to equate such literary weakness as spiritual weakness, by which they mean that if it is God's word, then the language must be impeccable all round. We Christians never claimed that the Bible was physically penned by God. We only say what the Scripture itself says, that it was inspired by God.

God bless you.