Inspiration! An orchestra can give an inspired performance. Artists can speak of their inspiration. Athletes are inspired by their Olympic goals.
Inspiration in this context is quite different to its use in relation to the Bible. In arts, inspiration refers to a state of creative fervor preceding the composition of a work; in the Bible it describes the way the Holy Spirit conveyed God's message to the writers.
Jeremiah accused God, saying, "Lord, you deceived me, and I was deceived; you overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me" (Jeremiah 20:7, NIV). He didn't enjoy being a prophet of the Lord at all.
Peter says, "Men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit" (2 Peter 1:21,NIV). As a ship carried along by the wind, they had no control over it. They had to proclaim the message from God.
When the prophet Balaam was hired by Balak, king of the Moabites, to curse Israel, he was promised earthly riches (see Numbers 22:37). But when, under inspiration, he tried to curse Israel, he could only proclaim a blessing (see 23:7-10,18- 24). When king Balak reproached him, Balaam said, "Must I not speak what the Lord puts in my mouth?" (Numbers 23:12, NIV).
"His word is in my heart like a fire," said Jeremiah, "a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot" (Jeremiah 20:9, NIV). Such is the nature of divine inspiration.
The Bible was given "by inspiration" (see 2 Timothy 3:16, NKJV). The Greek word used literally means "God-breathed." Humans wrote, but God so worked with them that what they wrote became His Word.
Some wrongly conclude that the authors received their messages through a process of mystical dictation. This ideaverbal inspiration implies that the prophet or prophetess works like some form of heaven-connected fax machine, transmitting mechanically what God says. Verbal inspiration requires the inspired person to transmit the exact words supplied by the Holy Spirit─just as a court stenographer types word-for-word what is said in a courtroom.
If this was how the Bible came into being, we would have great problems explaining, for example, whether it was Stephen or Luke─both believed to be inspired─who got some names wrong in Acts 7:16 (compare with Genesis 23:8; 33:18).
And if the Holy Spirit dictated each word why, then, do each of the Gospel writers quote the inscription on the sign placed on Christ's cross differently? While, in essence, they do not contradict each other, none of them, it seems, quotes the inscription in toto.
A better way
A better way of understanding the inspiration of Scripture is to see the Holy Spirit inspiring a prophet's thoughts-not their words. That is, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, the thoughts of the authors became the thoughts God wanted them to record.
God provided the thoughts, and the prophets, in relaying the divine message, supplied the best words in their vocabulary. The personality of the writers was not overridden as each expressed in their own manner what had been revealed. Although the prophets were human, the operation of the Holy Spirit guaranteed the integrity of the messages as the expression of God's will.
Ellen G. White has described the process this way: "It is not the words of the Bible that are inspired, but the men that were inspired. Inspiration acts not on the man's words or his expressions but on the man himself, who, under the influence of the Holy Ghost, is imbued with thoughts. But the words receive the impress of the individual mind. The divine mind is diffused. The divine mind and will is combined with the human mind and will; thus the utterances of the man are the word of God" (Selected Messages, Book 1, page 21).
Nature and authority
Such a view of biblical inspiration makes it unique in its nature and authority. Though God used humans to write the books of the Bible, they cannot be credited to the writers, only to God. Since the content of Scripture has its origin in God, it's endowed with reliability and trustworthiness. Along with the psalmist, therefore, the Christian can say: "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path" (Psalm 119:105, NKJV).
I have yet to hear a man or woman say: "I was in a terrible state; I was a hopeless alcoholic, a disgrace to my family. I contemplated suicide. But then I began studying philosophy and science, and this completely changed me. Since then I've been as happy as can be!"
However, there are hundreds of thousands of people around the world who can testify that reading the Bible has changed their lives. That's because the Spirit who inspired the word is the same Holy Spirit who speaks through the Word to the heart of its readers. Not all will respond, but all those who do will experience a transformation of their lives.
Gerhard Pfandl was the field secretary for the South Pacific Division at the time he wrote this article.
