Tremendous lectures on Sola Scriptura

Thanks to Chris Rosebrough for playing these magnificent lectures on the subject "Christ, the Reformers, and Sola Scriptura" on his "Fighting For the Faith" program.  

Sola Scriptura was the watershed issue of the Protestant Reformation.  The Reformation at the beginning was over authority in the Church.  The Reformers insisted on the Bible alone.  Rome contended for the Bible and (tradition, Papal infallibility, etc.).  So did the “enthusiasts” and the “fanatics”, only they contended for different "and" i.e. “the Spirit".  These are exactly the same battles we face now, because the twisting of Scripture is not the proclamation of Scripture and shivers in livers are not the evidence of the moving of the Holy Spirit.

The whole Evangelical world is claiming to be proclaiming the Bible, but they are really almost always doing something very different from that.  They are proclaiming pop religion sprinkled with out-of-context verses from weak translations and paraphrases in the name of Christianity, and consequently we are as much in need of a genuine reformation now as Europe was at the turn of the 16^th Century.

Sometimes people wonder what it is about the Reformation that I think is so great.  Steven Lawson does a masterful job at explaining it all.  I am not a great student of anything, Church History included, but I know enough about it to know that what I transcribed below, from the first lecture is dead on target.  I hope it whets your appetite to listen to both the lectures linked below.

“As they defined the true gospel of Jesus Christ, and as they brought into clarity the issues of the day, everything that they said, they sought to be defined and to be articulated by the Word of the living God.  And as there came in the Reformation this commitment to come back to the sole authority of the Word of God, the Bible was translated into the language of the people; the Bible was preached as the centerpiece of the worship service;

Pastors began to exposit through books in the Bible; all things in the Church suddenly became regulated by the Word of God.  The Psalms were sung in the worship service; Hymns were written to sing and to teach sound doctrine and strong theology.  Children and new believers were catechized in order to be grounded in the Word.  The pulpit was literally moved to the middle of the building, so that every sight-line in the entire worship sanctuary would intersect at this sacred desk, upon which there was an open Bible.

Bibles were printed with study notes at the bottom of the page.  Bible reading – the reading of the Scripture in the public worship service, came back into the service. 

Theology was again restored to be the “Queen of the Sciences”.  And the full counsel of God was taught, and the hard sayings of Christ were proclaimed.  And not only did they stand on sola Scriptura, they also stood on tota Scriptura.  All of Scripture, the full counsel of God, from Ch. 1:1 of the book to the very ending of that book, no bullets would be dodged, no subject would be left unaddressed, all that the Scriptures taught was brought to bear upon their lives and upon their heart, and as Phillip Schaff says at the beginning of Vol. VII of his monumental work on the history of the Church, “The Reformation became the greatest spiritual movement on Earth since the days of the Apostles.

It is by no happenstance that this movement was birthed in the womb of Sola Scriptura, and the church became The Church, as they became now the sounding board for the Word of God.

I believe that nothing is needed more across our land than for Churches to come back to the Word of God.  For the Word of God to be preached, for the Word of God to be taught, for the Word of God to be memorized, for the Word of God to be sung, for the Word of God to be embraced, for the Word of God to be obeyed, for the Word of God to be followed, for the Word of God to saturate the lives of true believers. 

If that were to happen we would see a Reformation again, in this hour. – Dr Steven Lawson, transcribed from lecture entitled Christ, the Reformers, and Sola Scriptura. Part I.

Christ, The Reformers, and Sola Scriptura, Part 1 by Dr. Steven Lawson

Christ, The Reformers, and Sola Scriptura, Part 2 by Dr Steven Lawson