It may be hard to believe it today, but there was a time when the Church tried to prevent Christians from having and reading Bibles. There was only one approved translation of the Bible, the Vulgate version written in Latin. For most people in Europe, this put the Bible in a language that they had no hope of understanding. Only an elite few who attended universities could read and write Latin by the 16th century. But there had been a movement for generations, a movement sparked by reformers like John Wycliffe and Jan Hus, that sought to put the Bible into the hands of people in a language that they could understand. That movement was driven by a knowledge that the Bible was the authority for faith and life. The Bible was the place where salvation by the work of Jesus Christ was found. The result was that when the Reformation burst forth after Martin Luther’s nailing his 95 Theses on the door in Wittenberg, one of the great rallying cries of the Reformation was “Sola Scriptura” (2 Timothy 3:14-17), or “the Bible alone.”

I. The Nature of Scripture
A. The Bible Comes from God
B. The Bible is PerfectII. The Power of Scripture

II. The Power of Scripture
A. The Bible is Clear
B. The Bible is Authoritative

III. The Purpose of Scripture
A. The Bible Teaches Us Salvation
B. The Bible Teaches Us How to Live

Questions for consideration: (1) Some have claimed that the Bible only “contains” the Word of God, but is not all the Word of God. What does that practically mean for us? (2) In what ways is the Bible authoritative in your life? How has it directed your decisions recently? (3) What does it mean that the Bible shows us salvation? What if it did not? Can someone be saved without reading it?