THE UNITY OF SCRIPTURE INTRODUCED

Throughout history, the authenticity of Scripture has been questioned. One of the particularly troublesome areas has been the unity of Scripture. The spiritually unlearned suppose, for example, that the God of the Old Testament differs from the God of the New Testament. This wholly erroneous view led some to actually eliminate what we call the Old Testament from their Bibles. "Marcion of Sinope challenged this view of unity (that the Old and New Testaments formed one contiguous whole). Influenced by the dualism of Gnosticism, Marcion preached a radical discontinuity between the Old and New Testaments (see the article on "Gnosticism"). For Marcion the god of Israel was not the Father of Jesus, nor was the law the gospel. Consistent with his theory, Marcion eliminated the Old Testament from his Bible, along with unacceptable (that is, Jewish) parts of the New Testament." ⁽¹⁾

It should not surprise you that similar positions have been taken today. They are somewhat modified, yet treat the "old Testament" as obsolete, and of no genuine value to the believer.

Word, Not Words! Book, Not Books!

God's Word is a single unit. It is not a library, but one volume! God is its Author, the Holy Spirit the means of inspiration, and holy men the instruments. Attempts to define different gods for different parts of Scripture is foolish and vain. It is equally absurd to represent the Word of God has containing differing Divine purposes. It is a single unit, with a single objective.

You will never read of Scripture as God's "words." It is always His WORD, singular. Solomon spoke of "the Word of God" and its purity (Prov 30:5). It is "the Word of God" that is living and powerful, not "a" word (Heb 4:12). The compilation of Scripture is called the "book," not books (Gal 3:10; Heb 10:7). The Bible is a single volume, expressing the mind of one God, given through one Spirit, and declaring one objective! The fact that some men have not been able to see this has no bearing on the matter whatsoever! Those that view Scripture as a group of unrelated fragments bring great disadvantage to themselves. They do no harm, however, to the Word of God!

1. Holman's Bible Handbook