As far back as the late medieval period, men such as John Wycliffe (c. 1329-1384) and Jan Hus (1373-1415) called the church of their day to return to Scripture.¹When challenged by hostile church officials, Hus answered his opponents, “Show me ... better out of the Scriptures, and I will forthwith recant!” Hus’s devotion to the sufficiency of Scripture cost him his life, for it compelled him to attack the principles on which the medieval church based the authority of its leaders and traditions.²

The Reformers developed Hus’s emphasis on Scripture to promote a recovery of the great teachings of the Bible. In a nutshell, they taught that the fact that the Bible is the written Word of God, supremely authoritative and self-authenticating, unfailingly true in all that it declares, clear in its doctrines, and made efficacious by the Spirit’s work, implies that the Bible is uniquely sufficient as God’s special revelation to us today.

Biblical Sufficiency Defined⤒🔗

The doctrine of the sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures teaches that “the whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary” for saving faith and the Christian life is revealed in the Bible. Therefore, the preaching, teaching, and counseling ministries of God’s church are the ministry of the Word of God.

The Bible is just as sufficient for the faith and order of the church as it is for the faith and life of the individual Christian. The sufficiency of Scripture is, however, limited to the Bible’s purpose in revealing truth for our salvation, faith, and obedience (Ps. 19:7-11; John 20:31). The doctrine does not assert that the Bible is sufficient to guide all human activities in every respect, except in the most general way. The Bible does not claim to be a comprehensive guide to astronomy, geology, nutrition, warfare, mechanics, business, history, medicine, public speaking, sports, politics, or a host of other topics. We must not consult Scripture as if it were an encyclopedia. Instead, the Holy Scriptures “are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 3:15). It is “profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (v. 16). Other matters must be governed by “the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed,” such as “Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31).

Here we must bear in mind the difference between the unlimited scope of the Bible’s inerrant veracity and the restricted scope of its perfect sufficiency. All of the Bible is inspired of God, and therefore all of it is truth. Whenever the Bible speaks, it does so with divine authority, including when it records historical events or teaches on human origins. The prophets and apostles did not limit the authority and veracity of the Bible to matters of faith and obedience. However, though the scope of the Bible’s inerrancy is as broad as all that it affirms, the scope of its sufficiency is limited by its divine purpose to lead us in the knowledge and fear of God.

The Westminster statement on the Bible’s sufficiency includes matters “either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture.”³

We are not, therefore, asserting that the Bible is sufficient only in regard to its “express” or explicit statements. The Bible does not address every conceivable moral situation in its laws, but sets forth principles of morality and wisdom so that we, by Spirit-illuminated reasoning in the fear of God, may deduce God’s will for us from Scripture. We must be careful, however, that our reasoning does not carry us beyond what the Bible implies. There are “consequences” that are not “good” or “necessary.”

Biblical Sufficiency Clarified←⤒🔗

The Bible’s sufficiency should also not be understood to exclude the use of the church’s helps, such as her many teachers past and present, and the writings produced by them. These are not to be rejected, but welcomed as a means that the Holy Spirit has provided in the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:28; Eph. 4:11-13). However, they are subordinated to the Bible in such a way that they have authority to direct our faith and obedience only insofar as they faithfully reproduce and apply the teachings of Scripture. The principle of Scripture alone, rightly understood, does not mean the church of any given time or place operates by the Bible alone without reference to the traditions of the church through the ages; rather, the sola of sola Scriptura means that the Bible alone is the fountain and touchstone for all authoritative teaching and tradition.

The Bible’s sufficiency as revelation should also be carefully distinguished from its efficacy. Let the sun shine ever so brightly, the blind cannot see it. The efficacy of the Word of God comes from the present activity of the Holy Spirit working with the Word (1 Thess. 1:5). However, this does not reduce the Bible to a dead letter. The Word and the Spirit are inseparable (Isa. 59:21; John 6:63), for the Spirit directed the writing of the Bible Word (2 Peter 1:20-21), and the Word is the great instrument of the Spirit for accomplishing His work in us and in the world (John 16:7-11; Eph. 6:17).

Biblical Teaching on Scripture’s Sufficiency←⤒🔗

Negatively, we find the sufficiency of Scripture asserted in the prohibitions against adding to or taking away from God’s Word. Moses said, “Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it” (Deut. 4:2). Proverbs 30:5-6 says, “Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.” Revelation closes with this warning,

For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.Revelation 22:18-19

Positively, the Bible bears witness to the completeness and finality of its revelation. The Bible is sufficient for moral instruction. Even before the coming of Christ, the prophet could say, “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee” (Mic. 6:8a). The Bible is sufficient for evangelical repentance and salvation. When He spoke of the rich man in hell and Lazarus with Abraham in heaven, the Lord Jesus presented the rich man as deny­ing the sufficiency of Scripture. He asked Abraham to send a man back from the dead to warn his brothers, but when Abraham said, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them,” the man in hell objected, “Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent.” In other words, the rich man claimed that the Bible was not enough; men need to see miracles. The answer of Abraham in Christ’s parable is startling: “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead” (Luke 16:27-31). The Old Testament itself, as a witness to Christ (Luke 24:44), was sufficient to lead sinners in the way of eternal life, and if God’s Word is rejected, then no miracle will suffice to convince them.

How much more is God’s revelation full and complete now that God’s Son has come in the flesh, and we have the New Testament! Hebrews 1:1-2 sets the paradigm for the finality of God’s revelation in Christ: “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.”

The Bible is truly God’s complete doctrinal and moral book of instruction for the family and the church (2 Tim. 3:15-16). Whether the minister needs to teach the truth, rebuke the erring, call sinners to repentance, show them the way to eternal life, or train the saints in godly living, the Word of God contains all the content needed for a complete ministry.

Practical Implications of the Bible’s Sufficiency←⤒🔗

The sufficiency of the Bible implies that whatever question or trial we may face, we must go to the Word of God for answers. That is not to exclude other sources from providing help, for we are not disembodied spirits, but physical beings living in community with others like us. However, the wisdom of the world cannot offer us real solutions to the problems of guilt, sin, bondage to wickedness, alienation from God, spiritual coldness and drowsiness, lack of spiritual joy and communion with God, etc. When we lack wisdom, we must pray for God to grant it (James 1:5), and seek it eagerly from the written Word as from His mouth (Prov. 2:3-6).

John Murray (1898-1975) rightly said, “Our dependence upon Scripture is total.”⁴He exhorted us to live out this conviction consistently, saying,

If Scripture is the inscripturated revelation of the gospel and of God’s mind and will, if it is the only revelation of this character that we possess, then it is this revelation in all its fulness, richness, wisdom, and power that must be applied to man in whatever religious, moral, mental situation he is to be found. It is because we have not esteemed and prized the perfection of Scripture and its finality, that we have resorted to other techniques, expedients, and methods of dealing with the dilemma that confronts us all if we are alive to the needs of this hour.⁵

Murray observed that some people “have relied upon our heritage, our tradition,” and others are “enamoured of modernity,” but both groups “are failing to bring to faith­ful expression the finality and sufficiency of Scripture.” Therefore, he concluded, “We must bring forth from its inexhaustible treasures, in exposition, proclamation, and application — application to every sphere of life — what is the wisdom and power of God for man.”[1]⁶This is indeed the calling of God’s people, for they are the people of the Word.

How well do we understand the sufficiency of Scripture? Do we search, love, live, and pray over the Holy Scriptures? Is the Bible the compass that leads us through the storms and over the waves that we encounter in life? Is Scripture the mirror by which we dress ourselves (James 1:22-27), the rule by which we work (Gal. 6:16), the water with which we wash (Ps. 119:9), the fire that warms us (Luke 24:32), the food that nourishes us (Job 23:12), the sword with which we fight (Eph. 6:17), the counselor who resolves our doubts and fears (Ps. 119:24), and the heritage that enriches us (Ps. 119:111-112)? Are we learning from Scripture, as Benjamin Keach (1640-1704) said, “The best way of living, the noblest way of suffering, and the most com­fortable way of dying”?⁷Has sola Scriptura become our personal watchword, causing us, like Luther and Calvin, to become captive in our consciences to the very words of God?

Do you believe that the Bible is God’s Word? Do you believe that it is sufficient to guide you to Christ and along the narrow path of holiness until you reach heaven? Then read God’s Word. Do not read it in a half-hearted, “I’ll do it because I’m supposed to,” attitude. Read it, as Richard Greenham (c. 1542-1594) said, with diligence, wisdom, preparation, meditation, conversations with other godly believers, faith, practice, and prayer.⁸Hear the preaching of God’s Word, every Lord’s Day, morning and evening, knowing that “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom. 10:17). The Scriptures are sufficient. Sola Scriptura!