All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.
(2 Timothy 3:16-17, NASB)

Thus Saith The Lord; Or, The Human Authors Of Scripture?

Often in discussions of current issues, such as those involved in the sin of practicing homosexuality, it’s quite common to hear something along the lines as the following from postliberal theologian Dr. Walter Wink concerning e.g. the first chapter of Romans:

Paul really thought that those whose behavior he condemned were “straight,” and that they were behaving in ways that were unnatural to them. Paul believed that everyone was straight. He had no concept of homosexual orientation. The idea was not available in his world… Paul believes that homosexual behavior is contrary to nature,…” (Online source)

As you can see the reasoning here is that “Paul” was writing thus and so as if what is written there in the Bible would then simply be Paul’s ignorant, uninformed opinion. And this would be true if the Bible was only a book containing men simply recounting their own subjective experiences with God and/or opinions about issues relating to religion; but it isn’t.

Of our opening text Dr. Ralph Earle is dead on target when he says: 

“All Scripture is God-breathed.” That is exactly what the Greek says. The adjective theopneustos (only here in the NT) is compounded of theos, “God,” and the verb pneo, “breathe.” This is one of the greatest texts in the NT on the inspiration of the Bible… Another outstanding passage is 2 Peter 1:21, which indicates something of how the divine inspiration took place. Here in 2 Timothy we have the fact simply and plainly stated; the process of inspiration is not dealt with. (The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 11, 409)

We’ll get to 2 Peter 1:21 in a moment but first consider that God the Holy Spirit, the Author of the Bible through human instruments of His choosing, also informs us — the word of God is living and active (Hebrews 4:12); and, we should be able to see within 2 Timothy 3:16 how the Lord is telling us that Holy Scripture is also one of His creative acts in way quite similar to God breathing life into Adam thereby bringing him to life.

Now we come to 2 Peter 1:20-21, which is critical to understand why the drift away from Sola Scriptura in evangelicalism in favor of the highly subjective Spiritual Formation aka Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism ala Richard Foster and Dallas Willard — Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Bob DeWaay, pastor of Twin City Fellowship just concluded Faith at Risk IV, “Sola Scriptura - The All Surpassing Authority of Scripture,” which also featured Gary Gilley, pastor of Southern View Chapel. DeWaay now shares his insight into these verses below and how it relates to the crucial and non-negotiable difference between Protestantism and the Roman Catholic Church concerning the authority of the Word of God in the Bible:

Now the [Roman] Catholic Church said that means lay people—ordinary people—can’t possibly know what the Bible means so the teaching magisterium of the church has to do it for them. But that is not the point. The meaning of the Scripture is determined by the Holy Spirit inspired author. In other words, these writers were inspired by the Spirit, and so [what they wrote] didn’t come from their will, it came from the Holy Spirit Who spoke from God. So therefore the interpretation of the Scripture is to determine the meaning of the Holy Spirit inspired author.

Now your own interpretation would be the postmodern idea that reader determines the meaning. A private interpretation is “this means this to me.” Have you ever been to a Bible study where they do that? Everybody gets their Bible. “Read a verse.” And you read a verse. [Then someone asks], “What’s that mean to you?” [Looking around the room], “What’s that mean to you? What’s that mean to you?” [And so on]. “Okay, next verse.” Well, what do you have but private interpretation? Somebody’s saying I’m going to infuse my meaning into the Scripture rather than finding out what the Holy Spirit said to me through the Holy Spirit-inspired author. (Faith at Risk 3 Conference, “How to Discern A True Work of the Spirit,” DVD Chapter 5, 12:38-13:57)

In closing this for now we see from the Example of Christ Jesus our Lord He also was looking for what God the Holy Spirit had to say in Scripture  —  Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are gods’? If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:34-35). Here we can glean a few very important point points. First Jesus of Nazareth, not just a Man but also the Lord God Almighty Himself in human flesh, just equated Scripture—your Law—with the Word of God.

Also secondly, by quoting from the Book of Psalms, which begins the last group of writings in the Hebrew canon, the Master has now included the whole Bible in this teaching. Then 3) notice that Jesus calls these Hebrew writings Scripture, and finally, our Lord says that this Word of God cannot be broken — i.e. done away with because it is the final authority on the matter. In other words, completely consistent with our opening text where Scripture speaks, it is God speaking.

Men and women, today there is a steadily growing number within mainstream evangelicalism—bolstered by erroneous teaching coming from Emerging Church circles—who would dare to call themselves Christians all the while attempting to cause people to doubt the verbal and plenary inspiration of the Bible. But above we see incontrovertible evidence from the eyewitness deposition of the Apostle John that Jesus Himself had what we today often refer to as a “high view” of Scripture.

Not only that, but we see yet another Example from the perfect paradigm of Christ Jesus—the Author and Finisher of the Christian Faith—toward Holy Scripture as well as the actual Source for the Reformation principle of Sola Scriptura. For you see, it was the Master Teacher Who taught the all oppinions in matters relating to God must be judged by the Bible. And as Dr. Walter Martin once stated: You have no right to call yourself a Christian and not have the same view of of Scripture as Jesus Christ.