John Owen · 77 of 157

Sermon XIV. Luke xvi. 29. · Part 1

Sermon XIV. The testimony of the church is not the only nor the chief reason of our believing the scripture to be the word of God.

“They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” — Luke xvi. 29.

As everlasting blessedness — men’s greatest and most desirable good — is that which God only can bestow, and the way to it, that which he only can discover (who knows the Lord’s mind like himself? who is so sure a guide in the way, as he who is himself the end? — nature can neither direct us to, nor fit us for, a supernatural happiness); so it is not only our interest to seek it, but likewise to see whether what pretends to be the rule of our walking, in order to our obtaining of it, be indeed the right one: which we can no otherwise be assured of, than by seeing that it be such an one as is given us by Him to whom alone it belongs to prescribe us the way, and who, being infinitely good, as well as infinitely wise, will no more deceive us than he can be himself deceived. Now, the holy scripture of the Old and New Testament, is that which we profess to own as the rule of our faith and life, in relation to our future glory. It is, then, the wisdom of every Christian to inquire upon what account he receives this rule; — why he believes it, and submits to it; whether he be persuaded that it is of God by God himself, or only by men. For if he can find indeed that he receives it upon the authority of God, he may be secure of the truth and sufficiency of it; but if only on that of men, they, being liable to mistakes, may lead him into error; and so he can never be sure that what he owns as his rule is indeed the right one, and of God’s own prescribing. Or admit [that] it really be so, yet if it be not received on right grounds, he will be exposed to innumerable fears and fluctuations, and never walk comfortably nor constantly in his way, when he doubts whether it be the right or a wrong one. The superstructure cannot be better than the foundation; and a well-ordered and comfortable conversation will never be the effect of an ill-grounded belief. It is good, therefore, in the beginning of our course, to be secure of our way, — to see both what we believe, and why; lest, otherwise, we be either forced to go back, or else upon as light grounds swerve from the way as we were at first persuaded to engage in it. Our great inquiry, then, in this discourse, will be, —

Upon what account we believe the Scripture to be the word of God; whether upon the authority of God, or the church? which I ground upon these words, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.”

In this parable, whereof these words are a part, we have an account of the different estates of a wicked man, Dives, and a good man, Lazarus, both in this life and the other. In this life, Dives had his “good things,” the whole of his happiness, all the portion he was ever to enjoy; and Lazarus had his “evil things,” all the sorrow and misery he was ever to endure. And in the other life, we have Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom, a place and state of rest, “entered into peace,” Isa. lvii. 1, 2; and Dives in hell, a state of misery, and place of torments; where, finding so great a change, and being deeply affected with his now woful condition, he is (though in vain) desirous, if not of release, as despairing of that, yet at least of a little ease; and therefore, addressing himself to Abraham, he entreats him that Lazarus might be sent to “dip” but even “the tip of his finger in water, and cool his tongue,” verse 24; but this is denied him as impossible, verse 26. Seeing that would not do, he desires, however, [that] his torments might not be increased by his brethren’s coming to him; whom we may suppose to have been his fellow-sinners, and partakers with him in his riot and luxury. Or, if you will believe so much charity to be among the damned, his request is, that Lazarus might be sent to them, to admonish them for their good, that so they might be brought to a timely repentance, ere they came to an untimely end, and then to endless torments, But this is denied him too, as altogether needless and unprofitable, verse 31; and he is told, that God had made sufficient provision for them, — given them the most effectual means whereby they might be brought to repentance, in that he had given them his written word, “Moses and the prophets;” by whose writings if they were not persuaded to repent, a miracle would not persuade them. Lazarus rising from the dead would no more be believed than “Moses and the prophets,” whose writings were among them; and therefore to them Abraham sends them, as a means sufficient for the end pretended, at least, by Dives to be aimed at: “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” As if he had said, “The will of God concerning thy brethren’s duty, and the truth of God concerning future rewards as the great motives to it, are clearly enough laid down in the Scripture; and if they believe not these things, and are not persuaded to repentance upon the authority of God in his word, much less will they be moved by the testimony of one coming from the dead.” Hence I infer, that the holy Scripture, or written word of God, is sufficient in itself, and most effectually able, to convince men of the truth of those things which are contained in it. It was so then; why not now? “Moses and the prophets” were so; why are not the apostles and evangelists? Is all the whole Scripture grown Old Testament, and so old as to be decayed? When and by what means did it lose that life and power, that authority and efficacy, it sometimes had? It had formerly more virtue to convince men than a miracle itself; and now, belike, it hath less than a council! It could have done more than a man “from the dead;” and now it can do less than a dead man, a sinful pope! For his Holiness of Rome may be very wicked, the Papists themselves being judges.

From the former proposition it will undeniably follow, that the Scripture is sufficient in itself to convince men of its own divineness, or its being itself the word of God, that being one truth it doth so often assert. The general must comprehend the particular; and therefore, if the Scripture be sufficient to satisfy the minds of men as to all that it affirms to be truth, it must needs be able to satisfy them as to this too, — that the whole of it is the word of God.

But this our adversaries will not allow; and therefore, instead of taking it for granted, or resting on this single proof, we must here put it to the question, from whence the Scripture hath its authority, or upon what grounds we are to believe it to be the word of God. If you will give the Papists leave to answer, they will presently tell you, “Upon the sole authority of the church;” or, “Because the church declares it to be the word of God;” and that “without the determination of the church, it hath very little authority or weight in it,” and you are “no more bound to believe the gospel of Matthew, than the history of Livy.” Nay, one says plainly, that “but for the church, you are no more bound to believe the Scripture than Æsop’s Fables.” And you may be sure the man was in earnest, when you do but consider how many incredible things another of them (alleged at large by our learned Whitaker) musters up out of the Scripture, which he would fain persuade the world would never be believed if the church did not interpose her testimony; and yet, as broad as the blasphemy mentioned is, another of the same party minceth the matter, and says [that] the words might be “piously spoken.” And if a private doctor of the Church of Rome may thus transubstantiate blasphemy into piety, or make that pass for pious which is really blasphemous, I see no reason why a pope might not add his authority, and make it canonical too. But, that we may give the best account of the controversy before us, — I. Some things must be premised by way of explication, for the better understanding of terms. II. The state of the question must be laid down. III. The truth confirmed. IV. Popish objections answered. V. Some application made.

I. For explication of terms, let us see, —

1. What we mean by the Scripture. By that, therefore, is understood “the word of God,” declaring his mind concerning men’s happiness and duty, or teaching us what we are to believe concerning God, and how we are to obey him; as it was at first revealed by himself to the apostles and prophets, and by them delivered by word of mouth; and afterward, for the perpetuity and usefulness of it, committed to writing, as we now have it, in the books of the Old and New Testament. So that “the word of God” and “the Scripture” are the same materially, and differ only in this, that “the word of God” doth not in itself imply its being written, nor exclude it, but may be considered indifferently as to either; whereas “the Scripture” signifies the same word, only with the addition of its being committed to writing.

2. What is meant by authority, when we inquire whence the Scripture hath its authority. Authority in this business is a power of commanding or persuading, or, as some phrase it, “convincing,” arising from some excellency in the thing or person vested with such authority. Whatever hath authority de facto, so far forth hath esteem and honour, or reverence, yielded to it; as whatever hath authority de jure, hath such esteem or honour of due belonging to it, and answering it as its correlate. And both the one and the other are founded on some excellency:— sometimes of nature, both in persons and things; sometimes of office and dignity; sometimes of knowledge; sometimes of virtue and manners; sometimes of prudence, as in persons: according to each of which, a suitable respect and honour is due to the authority therefrom arising. And as any man excels in any of these, so he hath authority in that, though he may not in other things. Thus, he that excels in the knowledge of the law may have authority in that, though he may have none in physic or divinity, in which he may not excel; and an honest man, that excels in morality, may on that account have the authority of a witness, though not of a judge. Now, when we speak of the authority of the Scripture, and ask from whence it hath it, we do but inquire whence it is that the Scripture persuades, convinces, or binds us to believe it, or commands us to assent to it, as the word of God; or whereon its power of so doing is founded, — whether it be not some excellency inherent in itself, or whether it be only something foreign and extrinsical to it.

3. What we mean by faith, when it is demanded why we believe the Scripture to be the word of God. Faith, so far as it concerns the understanding (for in some acts of faith the will bears part), is an assent yielded to something proposed under the appearance, at least, of truth, built upon the testimony of another; and therefore, according as the testimony is, for the sake of which we believe any thing, accordingly will our faith be:— if it be the testimony of a man or men, our faith will be a human faith; but if the testimony be divine, or we believe a thing because God himself asserts it, we call it “a divine faith.” Only we must remember, that a truly divine faith hath always God for its author; so that three things concur to the producing the act of such a faith:— (1.) The truth believed; which is objectum materiale, “the object of it.” (2.) The testimony of God concerning that truth; which is objectum formale, “the formal reason and ground” of this faith. (3.) The efficiency of God producing it or working it in the mind. Now, when we speak of believing the Scripture to be the word of God, we speak of a divine faith. A man may, upon the credit of his parents, of his minister, of a particular church, or of the church catholic, if such a testimony can be had, believe the Scripture to be the word of God; but the question will be, what kind of faith that is, whether such an one as God requires him to receive the Scripture with.

4. What we understand by the church in the question. “The church” may be taken either for the universality of believers in all places of the world, so as to comprehend private saints as well as public officers, people as well as pastors, and those of former ages as well as the present, — prophets themselves, and apostles, and penmen of the Scripture. Or we may take it for that part of the catholic church which lives together in the same age, (call it, if you please, “the present catholic church,”) comprehending in it all the believers, people as well as pastors, alive at the same time in the several parts of the whole world. Or else we may understand “the church” in the popish sense, only for the present church; and that, too, for the Church of Rome, which they call “Catholic;” and that, again, only for the pastors of it, excluding the people; and they, again, may be considered either separately or in conjunction, as meeting together in a general council; and that, either by themselves without the pope, or together with him; or, lastly, as represented by him, or virtually contained in him: for this great name, “The Church,” dwindles at last into one only man. But, sure, he is no small one that contains so many in him; for, if we believe the Papists (not only, though especially, the Jesuits), the pope, in this controversy, is nothing else but the church catholic compacted, and thrust into a single person, in whom all those several excellencies which are scattered among the members do, as in the head, collectively reside. And so the catholicness they vaunt so much of, is crowded into a narrow compass; for those, whether pastors or members of the church, that lived formerly, are first cut off, and the church is reduced to the present age; then the people, as excrescences, are pared away too, and the bulkiness of the church thereby lessened, the officers or pastors only remaining; and yet these, too, must be contracted into a council; and that at last epitomized into a pope, who is but the epitome of an epitome, and scarcely so much as a small synopsis of that voluminous thing “the church,” they talk so largely of.

II. For the state of the question, these things being premised, take it thus:— 1. In some things we agree with them; 2. In some we differ from them.

1. In some we agree.

(1.) That the scripture of the Old and New Testament, which we own (who yet exclude the apocryphal books of one sort or other) is the word of God, is acknowledged by them as well as by us.

(2.) Consequently, that it is in itself true and of divine authority, and that it doth not depend upon the church, as to that authority and truth which in itself it hath, — or that the testimony of the church doth not make it to be true, or to be the word of God, — the Papists themselves (at least the most wary among them) will (be sure, in words) grant. And therefore they have coined a distinction for the nonce: they tell us that the Scripture hath a twofold authority; one in itself, as it is true, and comes from God; the other in relation to us, as it binds us to receive and believe it. The former of these they own to be in the Scripture antecedently to the testimony of the church. The distinction is vain, when all authority is in relation to another, over whom either de facto it is, or de jure it ought to be, exercised. But let it pass.

(3.) That every Christian is bound, with a divine faith to receive the Scripture as the word of God, they grant as well as we do.

(4.) That the Holy Spirit hath a hand in men’s believing the Scripture to be the word of God, allow the Papists their sense, and they will likewise yield no less than we. That the faith whereby men own the Scriptures (if it be a divine one, as they say it is) is wrought in the hearts of men by the Spirit of God, they do grant, and must, unless they will avow themselves to be Pelagians.

(5.) And, lastly, that the church (allow us our sense) may be a help to us, and furtherance to our faith, in receiving the Scripture as the word of God, we will grant as well as they. That the universal concurrence of all believers in receiving the Scripture, and [that] the testimony they do, and in all ages have, in their way and capacity, given to it, is a strong argument to persuade dissenters to submit to the divine authority of it, we easily yield; and that it is the duty of the present church, during its time, to labour to preserve the Scripture pure and entire, and to hold it forth to others, and endeavour to persuade them of its divineness, and so to perform the part of a teacher, we are willing likewise to yield. And so, in a word, we acknowledge the usefulness of the church’s testimony, as an external help, and that by which some benefit may be reaped by men at the beginning of their faith. For it is the foundation of a human faith, and sufficient for the producing of that. And when a man hath so far yielded, as to receive the Scripture as God’s word, though only on the credit of men, yet coming afterward to peruse and study it, and look more narrowly into it, he may then come to see better and more solid grounds for his belief; and, God working on his heart by the word, he may come to receive it with a divine faith, which at first he did only with a human; as, in John iv., the men of Samaria, who first believed Christ for the woman’s words, did afterwards believe him because they heard himself. Thus far, therefore, there is some agreement between them and us. So that the question is not concerning the object of our faith, the thing to be believed; for both acknowledge it, in this business, to be the divineness of the Scripture: nor concerning the efficient cause of that faith; for both will own it to be the Spirit which works this faith in the heart: but concerning the medium or argument whereby the Spirit works it, and so the ground and foundation of our faith, that which is the formal reason why we believe the Scripture to be the word of God.

2. This, therefore, is the thing wherein we and they differ: something they affirm which we deny, and something we affirm which they deny.

(1.) They affirm the testimony of the present church (and that must be of Rome only now, for they count that only the catholic one) — that is, of the pastors of it convened in a general council, either with the pope, as some of them say, or without him, as others, or virtually in him, as others — to be the only sufficient ground of men’s believing the Scripture to be the word of God; and so tell us that the Spirit bears witness to the divinity of the Scripture by the testimony of the church, and makes use of that as the medium or argument by which he persuades men to receive the Scripture as the word of God; and that without that testimony, or antecedently to it, men cannot know, nor are bound to believe, the Scripture so to be. This we deny.

(2.) We affirm, on the other side, that the testimony of the Spirit of God in the word itself — witnessing it to be of God, by that stamp and impress, or, which comes to the same, by those notes and marks of divinity which everywhere appear in it — is the immediate and principal, and a sufficient, reason of our believing it to be the word of God, and the medium the Spirit useth in working faith in us, or making us assent to the divinity of the Scripture. So that, as the Spirit, working inwardly in our hearts, moves as the efficient of our faith, so the Scripture itself, in its own intrinsical beauty, lustre, power, and excellency, is that which moves us, in the way of an object or medium, to yield our assent to its being of God. By this the Spirit of God, as the author of the Scripture, witnesseth it to be of God; and, by an internal application of this to our minds, induceth us to assent to its so being. The testimony of the Spirit in the word is open, public, general, to all, if they have but eyes to see it; whereas the inward application of it by the efficiency of the Spirit is only to believers.

This they deny; and this we shall first, though more briefly, prove; and then disprove — as well as we deny — what they assert.

Argument I. The Holy Ghost, in Scripture, calls us to the Scripture itself, and God’s authority only in it, and not to the church, for the settling of our belief of its divinity; and therefore in the Scripture itself we have a sufficient argument to move us to believe its coming from God. In Isa. viii. 20, we are sent “to the law and to the testimony.” The prophets generally propound what they deliver merely in the name and on the authority of God: their usual style is, “Thus saith the Lord,” and, “The word of the Lord.” They do nowhere send us to the church to know whether it be so or not; but leave it with us, as being of itself (that is, without the testimony of the church) sufficient to convince us; and if we will not believe it, at our own peril be it. So, in the text, Abraham (that is indeed Christ, whose mind Abraham in this parable is brought in speaking) sends Dives’ brethren to “Moses and the prophets:” and our Saviour Christ sends the Jews to the Scriptures, — bids them “search” them, John v. 39; and so verses 46, 47. And Luke commends the Bereans, not that they sent up to Jerusalem to the church there, or waited for a general council, to assure them of the divineness of what was preached to them; but that “they daily searched the Scriptures, to see if those things were so,” Acts xvii. 11. But all this would be in vain, our labour would be lost in searching the Scriptures, and looking into them for the confirmation of themselves, if there were not something in them sufficient to persuade us of their having God for their author, but at last we must have recourse to the church to assure us of it. Why are we sent thus far about, if a nearer way be at hand?

Arg. II. Those properties which the Holy Ghost in the Scripture attributes to the Scripture will prove the same. It is light: “The commandment is a lamp, and the law is light,” Prov. vi. 23; “A lamp to my feet, and a light to my path,” Ps. cxix. 105; “A light shining in a dark place,” 2 Pet. i. 19. And, surely, that which is light may discover itself. He that needs another to tell him what is light, wants eyes. It “is quick, and powerful, and sharper than a two-edged sword,” Heb. iv. 12; it enters into the soul: and therefore by its own power and efficacy discovers itself to us as well as us to ourselves. It is “like as a fire, and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces,” Jer. xxiii. 29. So likewise, 1 Cor. xiv. 24, 25; and Ps. xix. 7, 8: from both which we may argue, That word which convinceth men, judgeth them, makes manifest the secrets of their hearts; that, again, which converts the soul, makes wise the simple, rejoiceth the heart, enlightens the eyes; is sufficiently able to discover itself to be of God, though the church should not give in her testimony; but such a word is the Scripture: therefore, etc. And, farther, why may not God’s word discover its author as well as his works do? If “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows his handy-work,” Ps. xix. 1; if “even the least creatures preach God to us,” they that bear not his image on them, yet have some vestigia, some “footsteps” of him; and much more [if] his greater and more noble works, the glorious fabric of heaven and earth, and man, the most excellent of his creatures on earth, show forth that excellency in them which manifests itself to be from none but God; and [if] he hath, in a word, left such an impress of himself upon his works, as that they generally proclaim themselves to be his; why should it be thought incredible that God should leave the like notices of himself upon his word, and stamp that upon it which might plainly evidence it to be his? Nay, if men do commonly make themselves known by their works, — writers by their skill, artists by their curious pieces; if Apelles could have drawn such a picture, Phidias have cut such a statue, Cicero have penned such an oration, that any who had judgment in such things might have said [that] such a man, and no other, was the author of such a work; surely, then, much more may God in so lively a manner express himself in his word as clearly to notify to us that it is his. And if any should say, God could have done it, but would not, I desire to know a good reason why God, who hath left us so plain and conspicuous evidences of his wisdom, power, and goodness on his creatures, would not leave the print of himself in the like manner upon his word.

Arg. III. God’s revealing himself to us in the Scripture is the first and highest revelation upon which our faith is built; and therefore that revelation is sufficient to manifest itself to us, even without the church’s testimony. The reason of the consequence is, because faith (a divine one, such as we speak of) being always built upon revelation, whatever it be which is the first revelation, whereon our faith is built, must be sufficient to notify itself to us; otherwise, our faith is not founded upon any revelation at all, if that revelation needs something else, which is not revelation, to give credit to it, or if that which is the first revelation yet needs another to make it manifest to us it is not itself the first; — which is a palpable contradiction. And for the antecedent, I thus make it appear:— In the business of faith, either we must come to some first revelation, or we must go on from one to another without any end; for either the faith whereby I believe this revelation — that “the Scripture is the word of God” — to be divine, is founded upon this very revelation itself, — namely, the Scripture, which so many times tells me it is of God, — or upon some other revelation. If upon this itself, then I have what I would, — that this is the first revelation whereon my faith is built; but if on another, I ask again, Must I believe that for itself, or for some other? If for itself, then that must be the first; if for some other, I shall ask again, Am I to believe that for itself, or for another? And so there will be no end, no first revelation on which my faith is founded, but I must go higher, and higher, even in infinitum.

Other arguments might be produced to confirm what we assert, and are by our divines; but I intended brevity in these; — and the truth we maintain will be more confirmed by what I am in the next place to say against the Papists’ assertion.

III. That, therefore, the testimony of the church is not the only sufficient ground (nor indeed a sufficient one at all) of our believing the divinity of the Scripture, I shall prove by several arguments.

Arg. I. I argue from Eph. ii. 20, And we “are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets.” The Scripture is the foundation of the church, and therefore hath not its authority, even in respect of us, from the church; but, on the contrary, the church hath its authority from the Scripture, upon which it depends in its very being, and without which it is not the church, nor if built upon any other foundation; it hath no authority but from the Scripture, — none in itself, but as thence it derives it, and we know none [that] it hath but as there we find it. And this is spoken of the true church, and not merely the church in the popish sense. If ever we would find out the nature and definition of the church, we must seek it in the Scripture, where alone it is that we see it to be God’s will to have a church upon earth, and by what means it is called, and of whom it is constituted, and with what power and privileges it is endowed. He that will question whether the Scripture be the word of God, will as easily question whether the church be the church of God, or whether God have any church or not. Now, if the church have all its authority from the Scripture, by which alone it is a church, and known to be so, how can it be with any reason said that the Scripture hath its authority, even as to us, from the church? For if the church have no authority but from the Scripture, then the authority of the church must suppose that of the Scripture, and the Scripture must be owned, or the church cannot be owned. For who knows what or which the church is, but as the Scripture describes it to us? And so the Scripture hath not its authority, as to us, from the church. For can the Scripture both give authority to the church, and yet receive its own authority from it? Can it authorize the church, before it be itself authorized by it? Can it give the church a power to communicate authority to it, and yet have no authority hitherto itself? Nay, can it be consistent with common sense, that the Scripture should give the church a power to bind men to the belief of it, and yet have no power in itself to bind the church to the belief of it?