The Cessationist View of Scripture: Refuting the Unorthodox Views of Steve Hays

In my last post, I pointed out that all knowledge is revelational in nature. In addition, I made a distinction not only between natural revelation and special revelation, but also between how regenerate and unregenerate men receive natural revelation. I stated that the Christian teaching known as total depravity asserts that unregenerate men uniformly and without exception, willfully suppress the knowledge of God they have within and about them. Paul’s teaching on this subject is unencumbered. That some men hold to a different interpretation of that text is no proof that Paul was ambiguous. If that reasoning were employed consistently to the whole text, the entire doctrine of perspicuity would be eclipsed by postmodern agnosticism. Orthodoxy has always had competing interpretations and she always will. However, Christians can fully rely on the work of the Holy Spirit to guide them into the revealed truths of Scripture. That is a primary function of His work.

What is the nature of this book we have called the Bible? What is Scripture? Why do we have Scripture? How should we view Scripture? How should we see the historical events in Scripture? Is the Bible different? Are the acts of God as recorded in Scripture different? Was God acting in typical fashion or is there a sense in which the acts of God in Scripture were special? When God spoke to Moses, was it a special event? By special, I mean can we or should we expect God to do the same thing with us? According to bloggers like Adam Hays and others, the answer is no. The events we read about in Scripture are not special in any sense. We should all expect God to visit us the same way He visited the prophets, the disciples, and others in Scripture. What happens if we accept such postulations? Does it even matter? I think it does.

The Scripture and the Spirit

A primary role of the Holy Spirit is to apply the word of God to the human heart. He is the great Teacher. Jesus said He will teach you (the disciples) all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. (Jn. 14:26) Again, “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.” (Jn. 16:13-15) “But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know.” (1 Jn. 2:20) “As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him.” (1 Jn. 2:27) Clearly there is a clear relationship between the Spirit and the Word. The Word is called truth in John 17:17. The Spirit is called the Spirit of truth in Jn. 16:13. The Spirit’s role is to take that which has already been given and to proclaim it to us. He did this with the disciples directly and He takes the same information given to the disciples, which has been encapsulated on the page, and illumines our understanding. The role of the Holy Spirit is indispensable to understanding Scripture. And the role of the Word is indispensable to discerning the spirits. They are inseparable. It is right to call Him the Spirit of the Word!

The Concept of A Sufficient Word from God

We toss around the phrase “sufficiency of Scripture” all the time and I fear without much regard for all that it implies. The view of that God has given us what is sufficient for faith, life, and godliness is as old as the Church. The Sacred Writings have always carried a prominent place in Christianity, at least until recently. In recent times many in the Church have felt quite at home handling the Scripture with no more fear than they do a pile of dung. There is no pause, no second or third thought about what it is they are actually touching. There is little to no consideration for the potential judgment they place themselves in when they take up the Holy Writ and mangle it to suit their own unbridled, undisciplined otiose speculations. We walk under the banner of a disfigured, manufactured, and humanistic view of grace and do as we please with the hallowed Documents. It as is if the Word of God was given to satisfy our intellectual lust for vain arguments designed to show off our debate skills rather than to transform our wicked hearts and lives into the image of the God we are sworn to serve! We smash the hearts of others without regard for the damage we do all in the name of “defending the faith” or of “doing apologetics.” The Word of God was given to change us, not so that we could have something to debate.

The doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture means that we have all we need in Scripture in order to walk in the perfect will of God. 2 Tim. 3:16-17 could not be any clearer. 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. The Greek word adequate means to be proficient and complete to perform some function. What function would that be? It would be the function of performing the good works of righteousness that result in the glory and honor of God the Father.

Now, let’s test this against the modern Pentecostal view. First of all, I am talking to the broad Pentecostal audience. This audience holds to a view known as the libertarian freedom of the will. The Pentecostal believes that God’s perfect will can be thwarted. The Pentecostal, for all intents and purpsoses, denies that God is absolutely sovereign over the state of affairs that have obtained. God has given to man the freedom to go his own way and to effectively resist His will. Moreover, men do this all the time according to the Pentecostal.

Now, to keep it simple, how does the Pentecostal idea of open revelation impugn the Sufficiency of Scripture? I am going to create a typical Pentecostal. Let’s call him Adam, well, because Adam is a common name. I have a son named Adam. I like that name. Let’s say that Adam, like nearly every other Pentecostal believes that God has a plan for his life. In fact, God has a perfect will for his life. If Adam could discover this perfect will for his life, this would mean he would be really doing more than the average Christian to honor and glorify God. He would be super close to God. He would be walking in nearly perfect obedience to God. When you reach this state in your Christian walk, God does special things in, through, and with you. But how can Adam get to that special place? How can Adam know the perfect will of God? Well, he has to pray, to fast, to give, and whatever else he can sacrifice to show God just how much he really loves him. God will help Adam get to this place by giving him dreams, visions, and prophecies and even speak to him directly.

Suppose Adam is thinking about getting married. Suppose he notices this very intelligent and attractive young lady that he thinks would make a great wife. Now suppose Adam wants to know if this is the woman God has for him. Adam will pray, and maybe even fast to get an answer. Adam may think that God has given him a dream that she is the one or not. Someone may prophesy that Adam should marry the girl. What happens if Adam does not marry the girl? What if Adam marries someone else? As far as the Pentecostal is concerned, God had another wife appointed for Adam, planned for Adam and now Adam has ruined God’s perfect plan. Adam is now not walking in God’s perfect will. In addition, what if God tells Adam that he is supposed to be a missionary but Adam refuses? Is Adam living in rebellion?

Pentecostal theology is based upon Arminianism theology. The reason the Pentecostal needs continued revelation is because they do not think the Bible in and of itself is enough. They need direction for their lives specifically that is not found in Scripture. It is not enough that God gave His word to the Church and therefore to us because we are the Church. The Pentecostal has an insatiable appetite to make everything about the individual. They want to know who to marry, where to live, which job to take. They believe that spiritual growth is based on experience. The closer they get to God, the more they will hear from Him outside of the Word. These ecstatic experiences will continually increase and this will show everyone else just how spiritual they are and how close to God they are, and how full of the Holy Spirit they are. They reject the orthodox teaching of sovereignty. They deny that God controls all things. They insist that man must find his way to God in addition to what Scripture teaches. The Bible is just the basics as far as the Pentecostal is concerned. It gets you moving toward a loftier goal. If you do things correctly (in the Spirit), God will talk to you directly, give you dreams, visions, and prophecies. You will find God’s perfect will and become a super saint.

In other words, since the Bible does not reveal to me God’s perfect will for my life, it isn’t enough. It isn’t sufficient to move me along to those deeper levels of walking in the Spirit. The Pentecostal may admit that the Bible is sufficient to save and maybe sufficient to get you into heaven. But the Bible, through these gifts, points one to a deeper, closer, more perfect walk with God. And this idea is a direct contradiction of 2 Tim. 3:16-17. The Scriptures are sufficient to bring the Christian to the place where they need to be spiritually. Nothing more is needed. Either the Scriptures adequately equip the believer to do all that God requires of them or they do not. Either God has revealed all we need to know in His word or He has not.

John Webster wrote, "What Scripture is as sanctified and inspired is a function of divine revelatory activity, and divine revelatory activity is God's triune being in its external orientation, its gracious and self-bestowing turn to the creation." [Webster, Holy Scripture: A Dogmatic Sketch. 9]

As for bloggers like Steve Hays, perhaps he is struggling because he has fallen on his own sword of contradictions or maybe he just has a propensity to one up everyone else. That his arguments have become wildly incongruent is obvious for all but his most biased fans to see. Webster says it like this, "If the doctrine of revelation has stumbled and fallen, it has not only been because Christian theology was tongue-tied in trying to answer its critics to their satisfaction; it has also been because Christian theology found itself largely incapable of following and deploying the inner logic of Christian conviction in its apologetic and polemical undertakings." [Ibid. 11]

Finally, to end the post, one more excellent quote from Webster: "In these form, the argument to be out here may be stated thus: revelation is the self-presentation of the triune God, the free work of sovereign mercy in which God wills, establishes and perfects saving fellowship with himself in which humankind comes to know, love and fear him above all things." [Ibid. 13]

Continuationists and Sola Scriptura

Someone clued me in that Steve Hays has been thrashing away over at Triablogue about the Strange Fire conference, miracles, me, Fred Butler, and how his opinion does no injury to the proven and veritable principle of Sola Scriptura. The goal of this post is to remind the reader of what we mean when we talk about the principle of Sola Scriptura and then to examine the principle of modern prophecy and revelation to determine if in fact one can hold to both principles at the same time without doing injustice to either. I think such an endeavor is besieged with copious exegetical and logical obstacles and I hope to show you why I think this way.

The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit or traditions of men.^[1]

So says the confession.

The supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.^[2]

Again, the confession testifies to the principle that I seek to defend.

When God speaks, men must listen. Steve Hays and other Continuationists have repeatedly made no distinction between the acts of God in Scripture and the claims about God’s actions outside of Scripture. It is as if there is nothing special, nothing purposeful beyond the acts of God in Scripture.

In other words, my dream cannot be distinguished from Joseph’s dream in Scripture. I must admit to finding such theories repugnant. Nevertheless, realizing that sinful men are given over to pursue one mad speculation after another in an attempt to carve a spot for themselves, I realize we have no alternative but to confront their madness with sound reason and Scripture.

Steve Hays holds to the view that the continuation of revelation and personal prophecy do nothing to detract from the principle of Sola Scriptura. However, I contend that Hays could not be more wrong for one very simple and easy to understand reason: God’s word, regardless of its form is always authoritative. Man is obligated to do whatever God has directed him to do without regard for the form of that direction. The principle of Sola Scriptura teaches that all that God has commanded us to do, all that he has necessitated us to do is positioned in the Sacred Scripture and no place else. All things pertaining to life, to salvation, to godliness, to spiritual growth, to exhortation are positioned and given to the Church through the Sacred Writings. We have no need of anything in addition to the divine revelation of Scripture in order grow in grace, and in sanctification, and to please the God who has called us unto Himself.

Now, the idea of additional revelation today, be it personal prophecy, or dreams or visions, is in direct conflict with the principle of Sola Scriptura. Suppose you walk into Church today and one of your elders prophecies that you are to leave your current job and accept another job, which requires relocation. The elder says that God has plans for you to do some particular work in a specific city. You walk out of church that day and discuss this “word from God” with your wife and family. You really don’t want to go. You don’t like the company or the man to whom you would report. Is it up to you? Can you inform God that you really don’t want to take that job and simply ignore His word? In so doing, have you sinned against God? Should your church family begin the disciplinary process outlined in Matthew 18? How can we hold to the position that refusing to submit to this prophecy is nothing short of an act of blatant sin? And if it is sin, then discipline must follow.

The rejoinder might be that such prophecies are not dependable. Therefore, we cannot be morally compelled to acquiesce to them. But this position impales God on the spear of obscurity. God is perceived to be unable to clearly communicate His plan to His followers. That is not the Christian view of God. Therefore, when God speaks, His speech must be deemed unquestionably reliable and therefore authoritative. That is precisely what we have in Scripture. And it is precisely what we do not have in dreams, prophecies, and inner-self talk.

Essentially, what this view does is place Continuationists in the position of being able to sin without actually violating Scripture. It also places Continuationists in the position of needing more from God to be able to walk more perfectly in His will. The more perfect will of God is the will of God that is beyond Scripture and customized specifically to you. And you are responsible for growing to a place in Christ where God can reveal this will to you so that you can be a super-Christian, walking perfectly in God’s will for your life, marrying the right person, living in the right home, and working at the right company and in the perfect field. This is why Pentecostals are obsessed with discovering God’s secret will.

If we must have dreams, revelations, and God speaking in our minds, then the principle of Sola Scriptura is completely eroded. In essence, we need more than Scripture. Moreover, Scripture is not the sole authority. Rather, God speaking is the sole authority. And that could be in Scripture or it could be outside Scripture. The fact is that it cannot be any other way. If God speaks, we are obliged to listen. The reason Scripture is the sole authority for faith and practice is not because it is written, but because it is God speaking. It does not matter if that speech takes the form of the written word, prophecy, a dream, or an inner voice. God’s word is by nature authoritative. Steve Hays has yet to offer a seriously tenable alternative to the principle of Sola Scriptura. In addition, verbal denial that one has not abandoned Sola Scriptura does not make it so. Just because one verbally affirms Sola Scriptura that does not mean they actually affirm the principle in practice.

I will now use Steve Hays’ own method against him. Hays has repeated pointed to Cornelius and even Paul and equated their experience with the modern experience of others, like Muslims for example, who claim to have been visited by God supernaturally. So let us take Moses and Jonah as our example. God spoke to Moses extra biblically and commanded him to strike the rock once. This was not a written command. Nevertheless, Moses was obligated to keep it. And when Moses failed to keep God’s command, the consequences were severe. And again, we see Jonah the Prophet who likewise never received a written command from God to go to Nineveh. When Jonah refused, God’s wrath was quite serious. Both Moses and Jonah were under obvious obligations to obey God’s spoken word. They recognized God’s word without any doubt. They had certified commands from God to do something very specific. Since Hays likes to liken our own experiences with those of divine revelation without any distinction whatever, then it follows that modern Charismatics who hear from God on such matters had better listen. If they do not, the consequences could be severe. Under that scenario, I fail to see how one could ever take the principle of Sola Scriptura seriously. After all, more is needed to carry out God’s perfect will in the earth. God must provide specific direction by way of visions, dreams, prophecies, and the inner-voice in order to carry out His divine plan. Scripture is simply not enough.

Continuationists argue that modern prophecy is different. It is not binding like prophecy was in Scripture. This is nothing less than special pleading. Hays wants to apply a stricter standard to the word of God as written or to prophecy within Scripture than he does to prophecy today. Continuationists have no exegetical or logical basis on which to base this argument. They think it can be so simply because they said it.

The principle of Sola Scriptura is constructed upon the nature of Scripture. Scripture is God speaking to His Church through the Holy Spirit. What God says is authoritative. Without equivocation we know that Scripture is God’s word.

We have not even touched on the implications of these views on the doctrine of revelation. Bavinck tells us that “Special revelation, in distinction from the above, is that conscious and free act of God by which he, in the way of a historical complex of special means (theophany, prophecy, and miracle) that are concentrated in the person of Christ, makes himself known – specifically in the attributes of his justice and grace, in the proclamation of law and gospel – to those human beings who live in the light of the special revelation in order that they may accept the grace of God by faith in Christ or, in case of impenitence, receive a more severe judgment.” [Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, Vol. I, 350] In the view of Steve Hays and others, there is nothing really any more special about Scripture than there is about modern prophecy and revelation. They are just as much the special revelation of God as is Scripture. The fact that it did not become written down is little more than an afterthought. Hays cannot have it both ways. If Jonah’s prophecy was unwritten and binding, then so are modern prophecies equally binding! How could the word of God ever not be binding?

The concept of open revelation at best gives sovereignty and Sola Scriptura nothing more than a wink and a nod. If open revelation is true, Scripture is not the only source by which we know God’s will. In fact, we know more of God’s will through dreams, and visions and personal prophecy. If God is still speaking new revelation, then men are still obligated to listen. If God is still speaking as He did in the text, then Scripture is not enough to accomplish His purposes in the Church and in His creation. Something more than Scripture is necessary.

If we hold to the principle of Sola Scriptura, and to the view that this document is the only reliable revealed will of God for His Church, then we cannot accept the principle of open revelation. If God is revealing what was heretofore unrevealed, then that revelation is special, authoritative, and binding. And if that is true, we must release our grip on the principle of Sola Scriptura and embrace this new principle. The Scripture, which we have held to be God’s once for all revelation to all humanity, is indeed not that at all. It is simply a collection of some of God’s revelation but there is much more that God has revealed supernaturally that we do not know. If modern prophecy is not special revelation, what kind is it? It certainly isn’t general revelation.

---

^[1] The Westminster Confession of Faith (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

^[2] The Westminster Confession of Faith (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

Lavish Lifestyles of The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movement

The Lavish Lifestyles Spawned By Charismania

I suppose the defenders will argue that this is just a small faction of abusers. It takes a great many followers to amass fortunes like this. Click on the link above to see this short special report. It is enough to make you sick. All of this in the name of Jesus Christ. And many in the Church are silent.