Think Like a Christian on Topics Not in the Bibleናሙና

Day 2: The Sufficiency of the Word of God

Today, we are often faced with challenging questions about things that are not specifically addressed in the Bible. Christians of the 21st century face topics like marijuana use, stem cell research, cloning, internet use, and a host of other issues that were not on the radar of the original recipients of the Scripture. Try as you might, you will not find those topics in the concordance of your Bible. But just because something is not explicitly in the Bible does not mean that God does not care or has no thoughts on the issue. Far from it. Paul taught Timothy, “And you know that from infancy you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to give you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim 3:15, CSB). 

We should remember two things taught in this verse. First, Paul promised Timothy, the young pastor of the church in Ephesus, that the Scriptures were sufficient to give wisdom for salvation. Wisdom is the right and deft use of knowledge. It is about knowing what to do at the right time and the right way to do it. Those who are wise do not need cookbook instructions on what to do in any particular circumstance. They are able to apply the instruction of the Lord to the various topics that confront them regardless of whether that specific issue is spelled out in the Scriptures. Perhaps another way to say this is that the Bible does not merely teach you what to think (though it certainly often does that); rather, the Bible teaches you how to think. It is about being taught how to fish, rather than just being handed a fish (assuming that you want fish in the first place).

Second, that promised wisdom does not apply just to the facts of the gospel, but to all aspects of salvation. God, through faith in Jesus Christ, has delivered a “great salvation” (Hebrews 2:3). That salvation is not just a matter of getting you into heaven when you die but it covers your justification, sanctification, and glorification. It carries you from your regeneration when you first believed throughout your life clear on to the final judgment and beyond. 

In the sacred Scriptures, God has given us all the divine words that we need to live faithfully before him. Notice that I did not say we have all the divine words we might want. The Bible is certainly not exhaustive of all that God could say or even has said. But we have all the divine words that we need. This means there is a lot of wisdom and knowledge in the Bible; more than we often think.

So be encouraged. God has spoken and continues to speak to us through the Scriptures. We have all the divine words that we need to faithfully navigate through all the twists and turns that the world, the flesh, and the devil present us.