So, as the Holy Spirit says… (Hebrews 3:7, NIV)
Any recreational golfer could have observed the young Jack Nicklaus’ performance in the 1965 Masters and said, “Nicklaus played a game with which I am not familiar.” That the legendary Bobby Jones was the one who offered up those words makes all the difference.
I was trained as a journalist. Thus, I was repeatedly reminded of the importance of attribution. Get the quote right, get the source right, and correctly connect the two. Who said what matters.
So among the attributions that hold great importance for me are those found in Scripture. Knowing who wrote which books of the Bible, and the life’s path that led them to that writing, helps greatly in our recognizing the weight of what was written. For instance, recognizing that David wrote Psalm 18 after being delivered from Saul’s murderous pursuit of him or Psalm 51 after his adultery with Bathsheba was exposed helps us gain contextual understanding and connect with the writer.
But here’s what I find amazing: the New Testament writers had little interest in the earthly writers of Scripture. Paul told Timothy that “all Scripture is God-breathed.” More than this, the writer of Hebrews kept referring to the words of the psalmists as God’s words! Over and over in chapter 1, the writer of Hebrews noted that “God said” or “he says.” That present tense is intriguing too, for it supports the writer’s statement in chapter 4 that “the word of God is living and active.”
If you are a firm defender of Scripture’s inspiration, you might question my fascination in this regard. Doesn’t everyone believe that Scripture is authoritative in this way? That’s just the point. Not everyone does. Critical academia is so enamored with the historicity of the texts—who wrote them and when and why—that much of their meaning is dismissed as ancient and thus applicable only to the people of the time. That the New Testament writers believed no such thing is of immense worth in our study of the Scriptures today. These writers took old, old passages of the Hebrew Scriptures and declared them to be not the work of men, but the words of God vitally worthwhile right up to their own day.
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Jeff Hopper
September 7, 2012
Copyright 2012 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.