Welcome to Christian Life Academy. This morning is the first Sunday of the month, so we are dealing with our systematic theology track, which means we are examining our Confession of Faith, the Second London Baptist Confession of 1689. So the confession, as we have said in the past, is basically a miniature systematic theology. The confession operates in the same way the systematic theology does, but it's not quite as robust, it's not quite as detailed as a full-orb systematic theology would be, but it is much more detailed than a typical statement of faith that we might see in most modern churches. What it's doing for us is giving us a systematic presentation of the important truths of the Christian faith. And our confession includes many truths that are fundamental to the Christian faith, things that must be believed in order to be a true Christian. But it also includes some distinctives, some things that set us apart, say, from our Presbyterian brothers and sisters or other different churches and fellowships within Christendom. But what the systematic theology presents to us are summary statements of what the Bible teaches on a variety of subjects. So these are not exegetical statements on particular texts. They are summary statements of what the Bible as a whole teaches based on a lot of in-depth exegetical work that has been done. As we begin to look at the confession, last month we looked at the letter to the reader, the introduction, and so this morning we'll begin to look at chapter one of the Holy Scriptures. As we do this, we find that the confession is organized into several units. Chapter 1, of course, begins Unit 1, which we're calling First Principles, and this encompasses chapters 1 through 6. Chapter 1 of the Holy Scriptures is the first principle, which is the principle of knowing, or in Latin, as the Reformers would have said it, the Principium Cogniscindi. This is the principle of cognition, of knowing, how we know what we know about God. We know it from the scriptures, right? God has revealed himself to us in the scriptures. Now, we have some revelation in his created order, and the confession will deal with that, but we need particularly the special revelation of God in the scriptures in order to give us the knowledge that we need for salvation. So, Richard Muller in his Dictionary of Theological Terms says that this principle is the ground or basis upon which something is known. So, what the confession is telling us is that the scriptures themselves are the basis upon which everything that we know particularly about God is revealed to us. So we start with the scriptures because we can't know particulars about God concerning the Trinity or salvation, things of this nature, apart from the scriptures. We must have the scriptures. Everything then that follows in the confession is built on this foundation of the first chapter, which is laying out for us what we believe concerning the Holy Scriptures. And this should make complete sense to us, right? As Christians, we are people of the book, so the Scripture is going to be vitally important to what we know and believe about God. Now, what systematic theology in general is doing, and what the Confession does for us, is that it starts with the exegesis of the text of Scripture, but then instead of laying out for us the exegesis of one particular passage, it collates the results of a broad work of exegesis of the Scriptures. It collates those results, summarizes them for us, and carefully articulates them in a systematic or logical way. So we start with Scripture and then we move on to the doctrine of God and then to the doctrine of men. So in this first unit and first principles, those are our three principles we're looking at. the principle of knowing how we know things, which is the Holy Scriptures, the principle of being or essence, which is the nature of God and His work in creation, and then the doctrine of man and sin and the fall. These are foundational to what comes afterwards in the rest of Scripture. So, each chapter of the Confession, the first paragraph of that chapter usually serves as a summary and then the chapters that follow that will further explain things that are summarized in the first paragraph. And this is true with this chapter on the Holy Scriptures. So let's read the first paragraph together and then we'll spend some time particularly looking at the first sentence in this paragraph. The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. Although the light of nature and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God as to leave men inexcusable, yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and His will which is necessary unto salvation. Therefore, it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in diverse manners to reveal Himself and to declare that his will unto his church, and afterward, for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing, which maketh the Holy Scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God revealing his will unto his people being now ceased. So, this is our summary doctrine of the Holy Scriptures, and this first sentence is extremely important. The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. That sentence is packed with a lot of theological truth. When it says that scripture is the rule, what it means by that is that it is the standard by which we judge and measure the Christian life. It is the standard by which we measure these three things that it lists, saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. Do we have saving knowledge? Well, we measure our knowledge by the scriptures. Do we have faith? Are we living out the faith in obedience? We measure these things by what the Scriptures tell us. And we can see that the Confession uses this language repeatedly. In paragraph 2, it will talk about the Scriptures being the rule of faith and life. In chapter 19, it says that the Scriptures are the rule of righteousness. And then in paragraph 6, the rule of life. And that one is actually worth reading if we go to Chapter 19, paragraph 6, it says that, although true believers be not under the law as a covenant of works to be thereby justified or condemned, yet it is of great use to them, as well as to others, in that as a rule of life, informing them of the will of God and their duty, it directs and binds them to walk accordingly. The scripture of the Old Testament, particularly, serves as a rule or a standard of life informing us of the will of God and of our duty, and it directs and binds us to walk in a certain way. Chapter 26, paragraph 12, talks about the rule of Christ, and this is particularly talking about the government of the church. that the church is to be organized and structured according to the scriptures as a rule, a standard for how we organize the church. In chapter 27, concerning the fellowship of the saints, the scriptures are again the rule of the gospel as mentioned as how we go about structuring and measuring our fellowship as believers. And then even in the appendix concerning baptism, the scriptures are then called a rule of faith and worship, that our worship, particularly concerning the ordinance of baptism, is to be measured against the standard of scripture. So scripture is the rule, but now we have to ask ourselves, well, what kind of rule is it? And this first paragraph, the first sentence of paragraph one tells us that it is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule. Now, this sentence might be easier to understand if we write it in this way. It is the only, and then we have sufficient. It is the only sufficient rule. It is also the only certain rule. And it is also the only infallible rule. So only modifies all three of those. It is the only sufficient rule, the only certain rule, the only infallible rule. Of course, this right here is where we get the term sola. If you're familiar with the five solas of the Reformation, one of them is sola scriptura, the scriptures alone. Now it doesn't mean, it's not nuda scripture, like the scripture bear with nothing else, right? It's not saying that nothing else can be helpful, but it's saying that scripture alone is sufficient, certain, and infallible. No other resource that we have is sufficient. for these things. No other resource we have is as certain as the scripture. No other resource we have is infallible. So what does it mean that scripture is sufficient? Well it means that it fully contains what we need for knowledge, faith, and obedience. These other things that come in at the last part of the sentence. So it is the only sufficient rule of knowledge, particularly saving knowledge, It's the only sufficient rule that we have for faith and the only sufficient rule that we have for obedience. Nothing else that we have is sufficient for saving knowledge, right? We can look at natural revelation, and the paragraph goes on to talk about that, that although the light of nature and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God as to leave men inexcusable, this is on the basis of Romans chapter one, yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and his will which is necessary unto salvation. Now, there are chapters in the Confession that will go on to deal with God's works of creation and providence, right? And the upcoming chapters that deal with those. But those things are not sufficient to give us the knowledge we need for salvation. We can only get that knowledge from the Scriptures themselves. They're not certain for that knowledge and they're not infallible, right? We can look at creation and come to wrong conclusions. Many people do, in fact. So the scripture alone is sufficient, certain, and infallible for saving knowledge. So sufficient means that it fully contains what we need, that other revelations such as nature may give us true information, but not all the knowledge that we need for salvation, for faith, and for obedience. That other revelation may be helpful, but is not necessary. The scripture is sufficient. If you have the scripture alone, you can be saved by the knowledge that it presents. You don't need the scripture plus something else. And so, that one is very important, and this is the doctrine of the sufficiency of scripture, that scripture alone is sufficient for our salvation, our knowledge of God leading to salvation, for our faith, for our obedience. We don't need some other document, including this confession, right? We need the scriptures in order to know how we live our lives as Christians in obedience to God. The confession may be helpful in summarizing what the scriptures teach, but it's the scriptures that are sufficient. And this goes for any other works that people might tell us that we need. So this is particularly important when you start dealing with different cults, various cults that will say, well, you need the scripture, but you also need the Book of Mormon in order to know these things. or you need the writings of the leaders of the Jehovah's Witness. If you don't have their commentary on the scripture, then you won't know how to live. No, the scripture alone is sufficient for these things. So the doctrine of the sufficiency of scripture is very important. And of course, it's encapsulated in our confession in the very first sentence. Why? Well, the Reformation period coming out of Roman Catholicism and the Roman Catholic magisterium teaching that the scripture alone wasn't sufficient. What did you need? You needed the pope and the cardinals and bishops to tell you these things. You needed the traditions of the church. And so the confession is saying, no, scripture alone is sufficient. Scripture alone is certain. It's faithful. It's trustworthy. It's unchanging, right? What did Martin Luther say about popes and councils, right? They often err. They contradict themselves. Scripture does not. Scripture is fixed and unchanging. We won't look it up, but in 2 Peter 1 verses 18 and 19, Peter relays the episode on the Mount of Transfiguration when him and James and John are there and they hear God's voice speaking from the cloud on the mountain. And what does Peter say? He says, but we have a more sure word, right? The scripture is more sure than the vision and the voice that they heard on the mountain. Why? Scripture is written. We can examine it. We can compare it. Peter's vision, we're relying on his memory of that vision and him relaying that to us and us remembering what he said. But Scripture, inspired by the Holy Spirit, is certain. It's unchanging. And it's infallible, which means that it is impossible for it to err. It's impossible for it to be wrong. This is stronger than simply saying it is inerrant. Inerrant means it has no errors. Infallible says it's impossible for it to have errors. It's impossible for it to be wrong. So, the Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule. There are other modes of revelation that the Confession addresses in the first chapter, general or natural revelation and creation, personal revelation, new revelation by the Spirit, and the traditions of men. None of those things are sufficient, certain, and infallible. None of those have the authority that belongs to Scripture alone. So what is it sufficient, certain, and infallible for? For saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. Saving knowledge is objective truth that we have from the scriptures telling us what we must know in order to be saved. Now, the first Sunday of each month in our sermons upstairs, we're looking at the Apostles' Creed, and this is a summary of those things that must be believed in order to be a Christian. We derive those things from the scripture. We're not making them up. The church hasn't made them up. out of the minds of men, but has derived them from the Scripture. These things must be known in order to be saved. And so it is the only sufficient rule, the only certain rule, the only infallible rule of saving knowledge. Everything that the Scripture says is true. When it addresses issues such as science or history, it's infallible, it's without error, it's impossible for the scripture to err. But it may not be giving us all the information that we might want concerning science. It gives us information that is true about creation, about the world in which we live, but it is not a textbook on nuclear physics. So it's not giving us all the information we need concerning different scientific endeavors. What it does give us is true. But when it comes to saving knowledge, faith, and obedience, the Scripture does give us all that we need. It's objective truth that we have from the Scripture. But there's the subjective truth of faith as well. Our faith is our personal trust in the knowledge we've derived from Scripture that we need for salvation. And it is the only revelation from God that can be trusted fully, right, not the words of pastors and preachers, the traditions of the church, the words of supposed prophets, but the scripture alone is the revelation that we can fully trust, trust ourselves to, for salvation. And it is the only certain, sufficient, and infallible rule of obedience. Now, this one is interesting because if we compare our confession to other Reformed confessions of the era, this is unique to our confession. It's not there in the Westminster or in the Savoy Declaration. And so we might ask, well, why did the Baptists add obedience? the Scripture is sufficient, certain, and infallible rule for saving knowledge and faith, why did we add obedience to the list? Well, I think there's a good reason. Obedience is our repentance, our daily living, our worship as a church, and there are three possible reasons why the Baptists added this line to the Confession. The first of those reasons is And you'll see that this all has to do with different groups that they were interacting with at the time, but there's still good reasons for us to adhere to this truth that the scripture is sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of our obedience. But in the period between the writing of the Westminster and then the modification of it into the Savoy Declaration, in the period between that and the writing of the 1689, which was actually first published in 1677, many of the particular Baptist churches in the London area had lost significant numbers of their members, some of them as many as 25% of their members, to the Quakers, this group that had arisen there in England known as the Quakers. The Quakers were teaching that that Christ was giving people direct experiences, visions, and what not, and that he was instructing them in how they were to live their lives. They thought none of the churches were pure, none of the churches were pleasing to God, and so that was the reason they started a new one. They were receiving these visions and these experiences of Christ where He was instructing them directly apart from the Scriptures. Now, some of the Quaker groups still read the Scriptures in their services, but they were relying upon and depending upon these visions and revelations that they were having. as to how they would order their worship together. And so the Baptists said, no, no, scripture is sufficient, certain and infallible for our obedience as a church. We don't need these visions. These things are not in accord with the scripture. The second reason why they may have added this line is because of the Roman Catholics. Because in 1672, again, in that period between the Savoy Declaration and our confession being published, The Declaration of Indulgence was approved by the King and Parliament, and this allowed Roman Catholics to openly practice their faith in England for the first time in quite some time. Benjamin Keech, writing in his work, The Gospel Mysteries Unveiled, says this, he says, If the Scripture be not the word of God, then God had left us no certain rule at all, either of faith or practice. nor is there any way for us to know truth from error. The papists say the church is the rule, but we rely on the scriptures." So Benjamin Keech is saying, listen, the Roman Catholics are saying that the church, the Roman Catholic Church, is the rule for how we should practice, how we should obey as a people, as a church. And so the Baptists were concerned because of this Declaration of Indulgence that had been passed in 1672. They were concerned, the Roman Catholics, would begin to try and persecute again, try to enforce the traditions of their church on people. And then the third reason that they added this likely has to do with the Presbyterians, quite frankly, the pedobaptists. They were arguing, members of the Westminster Assembly had argued that the analogy of Scripture, which we've spoken about before, which means if we look at the Scripture as a whole, and we say, what does the Scripture teach as a whole on this particular topic? The pedobaptists were arguing that the Scripture as a whole teaches infant baptism. We may not have a particular text, but the Scripture as a whole is pointing us in that direction. And the Baptists are saying, no, no it's not, actually. And there are some modifications to further paragraphs, even here in chapter one, particularly paragraph six, which we won't have time to look at this week, that are addressing that issue. And this very well may be the most important reason why they added this word obedience to the first sentence in the confession. So, this is really the most important sentence in chapter 1 of the Confession, that the Holy Scriptures are the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. And you can look up the footnotes, 2 Timothy 3, 15-17 is a passage that we have looked at. quite often that Scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for all these various things. I will leave it to you to look up these various footnotes. I do want to read the one that's in Isaiah, but again, the confession is not based on the exegesis of particular texts, but rather is a collation of all that the Scripture teaches on these subjects. But in Isaiah chapter 8 verse 20, speaking of false teachers, of false prophets, the prophet Isaiah says this, God speaking through him says, And when they say to you, Seek those who are mediums and wizards who whisper and mutter, should not a people seek their God? Should they seek the dead on behalf of the living? He says, shouldn't you turn to God rather than turning to these people who claim to have secret knowledge or a word from the other side? And then he says, to the law and to the testimony. In other words, to the scripture. If they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. And so that's really what this first sentence in the confession is saying, is that any other revelation that people might claim is sufficient, certain, or infallible, if it's not speaking according to the scripture, it does not have the light of God in it, and it is not sufficient, certain, or infallible. Now the confession goes on here in paragraph one to deal with natural revelation. As we have said in that second sentence, the light of nature and the works of creation and providence, they teach us that God is good, that God is wise, that God is powerful. But they do not teach us how we can be reconciled with this good, wise, and powerful God. For that, We need the scriptures particularly. The works of creation and providence will be detailed in chapters 4 and 5 of the Confession. It goes on to speak of special revelation. It says, therefore, it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in diverse manners to reveal himself and to declare that his will unto his church. So he's revealed himself at different times throughout the history of his people to prophets and to those who would speak to the people the words from God. But these words are given to individuals. They're special revelation, but they're given to individual people. And then it says, and afterward, for the better preserving and propagating of the truth and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church, against the corruption of the flesh, the malice of Satan, and the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing." So the scriptures had been revealed to prophets and apostles, but then were committed to writing, superintended by the Holy Spirit, for a reason. In order to preserve that word for us, in a more certain form, as Peter says, in 2 Peter, but also to propagate it. It makes it easier for us to spread the word of the gospel because we have it in written word. We don't have to simply explain it mouth to mouth, but we can print it and we can send the Bibles around the world and get Bibles into the hands of the people. but it's also to establish a more sure foundation for the church and the comfort of the church. And you'll notice that it says, against the corruptions of the flesh, the malice of Satan, and of the world. It's a slightly different order, but it's the same trio that we see in scripture, the world, the flesh, and the devil. And so the written word of God provides for us a foundation and a comfort as we are opposed by our own sinful nature, by the corruption in the world around us and by the temptations and attacks and oppression of Satan. Other modes of revelation, then it tells us, have now ceased since it has been committed to the written scriptures. It says it makes the holy scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God revealing his will unto his people being now ceased, so God is no longer revealing his word to individuals in specific ways, dreams, visions, this sort of thing, because we have the written word which is sufficient, it is certain, it is infallible, we no longer need those things. Again, Benjamin Keech comments and says, expect no new revelation from God, for God hath established his word forever. He will not alter the thing that has gone out of his mouth. He's given us His Word and He has established it in writing. He's not going to alter it. He's not going to give us something that tells us to do something in opposition to what is written in His Word. And because it is sufficient, He's not going to give us anything else. This is what we need for saving knowledge, for faith, and obedience. This is in God's good grace what He has determined is necessary for us to prepare us for eternity. But then the question becomes, okay, well, what are the scriptures? Which books are included? And so paragraph two addresses this. Under the name of Holy Scripture, or the word of God written, are now contained all the books of the Old and New Testament, which are these. And then it lists them from Genesis to Revelation, those that are printed in our Bibles. The final sentence of this paragraph is very important. All of which are given by inspiration of God to be the rule of faith and life. And again you'll see the footnote is referring to 2 Timothy 3.16 that all scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable. for doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction, and righteousness. So all of these books from Genesis to Revelation are inspired by God and therefore they have a divine origin. They're breathed out by God himself and because they are breathed out by God, they have God's authority. They are God's very word to us. So they have an authority that no other revelation does, no other writings have. They are the only rule of faith and life. Then in paragraph 3, it addresses the issue of the Apocrypha. The book is commonly called Apocrypha, not being of divine inspiration. are no part of the canon or rule of the scripture, and therefore are of no authority to the church of God, nor to be any otherwise approved or made use of than other human writings." Now it doesn't say the Apocrypha should be burned, right? That's not what it says. It just says they're not inspired by God. These books have no authority in the church any more so than the authority of any other human writings. Roman Catholicism argued differently, didn't it? It said, no, the Apocrypha is part of the Canon of Scripture, it is authoritative, and they develop doctrines such as the Doctrine of Purgatory on the basis of what's written in the Apocrypha. But the Protestants are saying, no, these books are not inspired by God, they don't have that authority in the Church. You can't build doctrine on them apart from what's written in Genesis through Revelation. So you can see how these other paragraphs are explaining and expanding upon what was summarized for us in paragraph one. Well, then we get to paragraphs four and five, which are the last two we'll look at this morning, and this addresses the authority of scripture. Paragraph four addresses for us the source of scripture's authority. The authority of the holy scripture for which it ought to be believed dependeth not upon the testimony of any man or church. The church doesn't tell us which books are in the Bible and therefore they have authority because the church said so. That's not what we believe. It says that the authority of the Holy Scripture is holy upon God, who is truth itself, the author thereof. Therefore, it is to be received because it is the Word of God. See, the Scriptures are breathed out by God. They take on His character. God is truth. And so His Scripture, His Word, is truth, as Jesus says in John 17. So, it has authority because it is God's Word, it is God's truth spoken to us infallibly, sufficiently, and certainly. It is not derived from the church. The Roman Catholics would argue that it is, right? That the church determines what is and is not scripture. The Protestants are saying, no, actually, scripture is the rule given to us by God and the church only has authority as long as it adheres to, teaches, and is ordered by the Scriptures. Roman Catholicism would put the Church above the Scriptures and say that the Church determines what is Scripture and what isn't Scripture. The Protestants say, no, Scripture determines what is and isn't a church. So it's completely backwards to what Roman Catholicism would believe. And then paragraph five gives us the proof of the authority of scripture. We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the church of God to a high and reverent esteem of the holy scriptures and the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine and the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole, which is to give all glory to God, The full discovery it makes of the only way of man's salvation and many other incomparable excellencies and entire perfections thereof are arguments whereby it doth abundantly evidence itself to be the Word of God. Yet, notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and with the Word in our hearts. So, you can see this paragraph presents to us first that there is external evidence and proof of the authority of Scripture, and that is the testimony of the Church. The testimony of the Church, which we just said in paragraph 4, does not determine what is and is not Scripture. And yet, paragraph 5 says the testimony of the Church, though, is real. It does testify to the authority of Scripture. But the testimony of the Church is not binding on us. Scripture itself is binding. But then it refers to six forms of internal evidence that we might see within the Scriptures. The heavenly subject matter. As we read the Scriptures, what we read about, God, creation, man, salvation, eternity. This is heavenly subject matter. Subject matter that is more elevated, more majestic than we find in the writings of men. We see that its teaching is effective in the lives of those who believe and obey it. The efficacy of the doctrine, the style of it is majestic. It's the Word of God. It evidences itself to be the Word of God because of the way in which it is written. It's consistent internally, right? There's no contradictions within the scripture. It has a unified purpose. And I do want to take a moment here to address this phrase, the scope of the whole. What it means by the scope of the whole is the focus or the aim of scriptures. The easiest way to think about this is if you're at all familiar with hunting or shooting firearms, think of a scope that's on a rifle. When it talks about the scope of the whole, it's talking about the aim of scripture as a whole. Think about looking through a scope. What are you focusing on? What is the target? What is the scope of the whole? It says there in the parenthesis, which is to give all glory to God. That's the main focus of Scripture. In our creation, in our salvation, in our glorification into eternity, the whole aim of that is to give all glory to God. So the scope of the whole is that focus on the glory of God in our salvation. And then that it is sufficient for salvation. And by all these things it evidences itself to be the Word of God. Yet, The true thing by which we understand the authority of Scripture is the divine evidence of the Spirit itself using the Word in our own lives for our salvation and our sanctification. Now this thought is developed further in chapter 14, paragraph 2, where the Spirit uses the Word for our salvation, but it is the work of the Spirit inwardly in our hearts bearing witness by and with the Word that it does save us, that it does prepare us for eternity. Those who do not have the scripture will reject the authority, do not have the spirit, will reject the authority of the scripture. And that's kind of the main point of that last phrase there in paragraph five is that those who do not have the spirit will reject the this idea that the Scripture is authoritative because it is the Word of God and for no other reason. They'll say, no, no, it's authoritative because we say it's authoritative or because the traditions, the Protestants are saying, no, it's the Spirit bearing witness in our spirits that this is the Word of God, that we are saved by it. and therefore it has authority. And if you don't see that, then it's because you don't have the Spirit. And we'll see even this morning as we look in the sermon that the Spirit, even in the life of Christ, uses the Word of God. And if He uses the Word of God in the life of the Son, who is the Word, how much more in the lives of those who are dependent upon the Son for their salvation. So it's the Scripture working through the Word for our salvation. And that's all we have time for this morning. Next month, we'll look at the final five chapters of paragraph one. Let's close in a word of prayer.