Every Jot and Tittle: Christ’s View of Scripture

During the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, Her Majesty received a Bible as representatives of the Church of England spoke these words:

Our gracious Queen: To keep your Majesty ever mindful of the law and the Gospel of God as the Rule for the whole life and government of Christian Princes, we present you with this Book, the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is Wisdom; this is the royal Law; these are the lively Oracles of God.

This incredible testimony to the truth in the halls of power echoes what Jesus declared on a mountainside some two thousand years before: “Truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished” (Matt. 5:18). Jesus clearly believed not only in the importance of the Bible but also in its absolute, surpassing, and lasting truth—that it contains the “lively Oracles of God,” not to be superseded with the passage of time.

So, as followers after Jesus, what are we to do with this book that He so clearly and highly valued? In an age when people strive to make their own “truth,” it’s an important question—and we will do well to begin by considering what Jesus and His disciples did with it first.

What Did Jesus Do with the Bible?

In those words on the mountainside, Jesus provided us with a very straightforward and clear statement of His own view of Scripture: He said that the Old Testament—the Bible that He knew and taught—is absolutely trustworthy, even down to the smallest detail, the smallest stroke of the smallest letter.

Now, it is one thing for someone to make a declaration like that. It is another to bear out that conviction in everyday life. Yet that is what we see that Jesus did. In the wilderness, He answered the devil with Scripture. (See, for example, Luke 4:1–13.) At the synagogue in Nazareth, He declared His own ministry to be a fulfillment of Scripture (Luke 4:14–21). In the upper room, He saw His looming death in light of the Scriptures (Matt. 26:24; Mark 14:21). In other words, the Lord Jesus Himself used His Bible to decipher the providences of God in His own life.

Jesus said that the Old Testament is absolutely trustworthy, even down to the smallest detail, the smallest stroke of the smallest letter.

After His resurrection, too, Jesus was insistent and consistent in pointing to the Scriptures. On the road to Emmaus, speaking to the two disciples, Jesus “interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:27). Later those disciples reflected not that Jesus’ appearance or manner had encouraged them but that their hearts burned within them as He opened up the Scriptures (v. 32). Jesus soon stood among the Eleven, reminding them how He had told them, “Everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” And on that occasion, “he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures” (vv. 44–45).

The confidence of heaven, in other words, resides in the Scriptures. And surely no follower of Jesus could possibly have a lesser view of Scriptures than Jesus Himself.

What Did the Apostles Do with the Bible?

Given what Jesus had taught them, it’s no surprise to find that the apostles themselves were confident in the authority and truthfulness of the Scriptures as well. Peter wrote in his second letter that “no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (1:20–21). Similarly, Paul asserts that the Scriptures have their origin in God when he writes, “All Scripture is breathed out by God” (2 Tim. 3:16).

When Paul wrote that to Timothy, he wasn’t telling him something new so much as reminding him of something critical. Timothy was living in a challenging time, made all the more challenging by the anticipation that his mentor, Paul, would not be with him much longer. Yet it wasn’t Paul’s presence, love, or wisdom that Timothy’s life and ministry would stand or fall on; it was the Word of God, revealed in the Scriptures—utterly reliable, divinely inspired, and entirely sufficient for the task. If Timothy were to lose confidence in the truth, power, and relevance of Scripture, then there would be nothing for him to pass to faithful men who would then in turn be enabled to teach others also (2 Tim. 2:2). If he were to lose confidence in this, then there would be nobody who would be “complete” and “equipped” through the Scriptures (2 Tim. 3:17). The Word of God was, and is, vital!

H. G. C. Moule has written that the church, at the time of this transition from Paul’s generation to Timothy’s, “trembled, humanly speaking, on the verge of annihilation.” There was no guarantee that it was going to make the jump from the apostolic to the postapostolic church. That’s why it was so important that the ministry of the Gospel be founded not on the personalities of the apostles but on the unchanging trustworthiness of the Word of God.

What Should We Do with the Bible?

The question for us today is not only “What did Jesus do with the Bible?” and “What did the apostles do with the Bible?” but “What will we do?”

As Timothy carried on the work, so must we. We no longer have prophets. We don’t have the Lord Jesus physically present with us as He was with His disciples. As John Murray puts it, “Scripture in its total extent, according to the conception entertained by our Lord and his apostles, is the only revelation of the mind and will of God available to us. … It is the only extant revelatory Word of God.”

The Bible is not like any other book.

Of course, its power lies not only in conveying information but also in its spiritual effectiveness: It is “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16–17). It is possible to be formally committed to the fact that the Word of God is living and authoritative without being ourselves arrested by it, summoned into its presence, and bowing in reverence before the one to whom it points.

The Bible is not like any other book. We don’t merely sit down with it, get a cup of tea, and say, “Now, I’m going to see if I can understand this book.” No, we address ourselves to it, and somewhere along the line, it suddenly becomes apparent to us: “This book understands me!” We realize that its words make demands on us and call us to a life in Christ that we cannot manufacture for ourselves.

In the 1950s, James S. Stewart, addressing students and faculty at Yale Divinity School, warned them about embracing a view of Scripture that was “theologically vague and harmlessly accommodating.” That warning has gone unheeded in many quarters of the church today. Christians are prepared to revise the Scriptures when it comes to marriage, worship, and all sorts of other matters, because to bend to the culture is easier in the moment than to bow the knee to God revealed in His Word.

The pulpits of our nations require men convinced that the Word of God does the work of God by the Spirit of God and who will serve the next generation by expounding, proclaiming, applying, living, and loving the Bible that Jesus loved, that spoke of Him. The Bible that was so important to Jesus and His apostles can be no less important to His people today.

This article was adapted from the sermon “Not One Jot or Tittle” by Alistair Begg.

1. H. C. G. Moule, The Second Epistle to Timothy (London: Religious Tract Society, 1906), 18.