The Counsel of the Westminster: Q. V

The Church of Christ cannot be creedless and live.
Especially in an age of doubt and confusion,
it is her duty to define the Christian faith and proclaim it to the world.

What do the scriptures principally teach?

The scriptures principally teach, what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man.


Hold fast to the form of sound words, which you have heard from me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus (2 Tim. 1:13).


This has been a very helpful question and answer for me. How important for the Christian to have a structured answer for what the Bible principally teaches. The Westminster claims it teaches who God is, and what He commands us to do.

Let's think about some of the things that would apply under these two catagories:

What we are to believe about God: Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, Holiness, Justice, Grace, Wrath, Mercy, God's relationships and covenants with mankind, God's decrees, God's heart.

What we are to believe about what God requires of us: keeping the law, faithfulness, repentance toward God, faith in Jesus Christ, holiness.

All the great things can be put under these two categories. Considering the historical books of the Bible (Kings, Chronicles, Ezra...etc), the confession is claiming that God is teaching us who He is and what He requires of us - which is why I went on a spill about Christians desperately needing to read the whole Bible my last post. It's easy to assume we understand God, but God is too big. Mankind (Christian or not) cannot possibly just naturally learn these things, who God is and what He requires of us, through personal feelings and life's experiences. We, as Christians, are to carefully search and submit to all that we find in His Word. Anything outside of the Word of God will only lead to confusion, danger, and in the end, death.

The Counsel of the Westminster: Q. III & IV

The Church of Christ cannot be creedless and live.
Especially in an age of doubt and confusion,
it is her duty to define the Christian faith and proclaim it to the world.

It's been a while! Sorry about that, I just got really busy (at least emotionally-busy) trying to get set up for school again and many other things.

Let's take the next two questions since they are very closely related.

What is the word of God?
The holy scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the word of God, the only rule of faith and obedience.

How does it appear that the Scriptures manifest themselves to be the word of God?
The scriptures manifest themselves to be the word of God, by their majesty and purity, by the consent of all the parts, and the scope of the whole, which is to give all glory to God; by their light and power to convince and convert sinners, to comfort and build up believers unto salvation: but the Spirit of God bearing witness by and with the scriptures in the heart of man, is alone able fully to persuade it that they are the very word of God.

2 Tim. 3:16
All scripture is given by inspiration of God.

2 Peter 1:19
We also have a more sure word of prophecy; where you would do well to take heed of, as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day of dawn, and the daystar arises in your hearts.

(the Westminster quotes a few pages worth of verses for these two questions. Hehe, if you wanted to look it up, feel free too, but I don't think I'll type them all up!)

If there's one thing I would say that myself and my Christian brothers and sisters desperately need, perhaps it would be this: We must be convinced that the Bible is the Word of God and it all still applies or relates to us one way or another! And we become convinced, not by the testimony of other men, but by our own knowing of it and experiencing it in our life through faith.

Are you so convinced? This question doesn't require a verbal answer, but an action. If it is your bread, then eat it. And eat it will all diligence, fear, and reverence that you have within your soul. My generation is a New Testament generation, and to their shame. I would say the bigger mistake this generation has made is in the very moment they ignored the Old Testament and all that it teaches, they lost the context the New Testament was written in. Why else is there such an unexplainable lack of depth and understanding of God's character and how He relates to mankind? The golden phrase of this generation is "God wouldn't do that", when God had already done that in history past and promises to do that in the future.

Churches and pastors are moving away from holiness, because they don't pay attention that God's name is Holy (something defined hard and clear in the OT) - and that will never change. There is big problem in the church today were men divide the times of history up into dispensations, to the effect of basically teaching that the character traits of God in the Old Testament don't apply to us in the New Testament because He deals with us a different way now. And great magnificant truths that were laid out clearly in the Old, like the fear of God, are still applicable today. God's character has not changed at all. The God who is a God of love in the New Testament (1 John 4:8) is a God of love in the Old Testament (Deut. 7:9), and the God who is a God of wrath in the Old Testament (Nah. 1:2) is still a God of wrath in the New Testament (John 3:36; Eph. 5:6).

This generation finds the Old Testament dry and boring. But whoever reads this, please don't let what God said to the hypocrites be true of you, "I have written to him the great things of My law, but they were counted as strange things" (Hosea 8:12).