The Unity and Diversity of Scripture

When reading Scripture, believers can observe that many styles and personalities are present among its forty-plus authors. These differences in Scripture have come about because as God spoke through the human authors, He did not completely dictate the words they used. God allowed the human authors of Scripture to write using their personalities. This can be known as the diversity of Scripture. This does not discount Scripture’s accuracy, rather, it shows that God is a personal God Who was engaged with the lives of the authors in the time of writing (and He is still involved with believers’ lives today). The diversity of Scripture helps readers to recognize that God used Paul’s style of writing to reach people in a different way than He used Peter’s (to name one example). Diversity can also be understood as an example of the body of Christ having many members. “For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit” (1 Cor. 12:12–13 NASB). God uses the many members in the different ways that He has gifted them. Diversity in Scripture is just one of the ways it remains effective to this day.

Diversity in Scripture is important; however, without unity, it is just a collection of good moral writings. “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). God inspired Scripture and its purpose is so that believers are adequate for the work ahead of them. To know Scripture involves understanding there is a meta-narrative that flows from creation to consummation. When one interprets Scripture, they must always remember that Scripture interprets Scripture. This is why Duvall and Hays call believers “[c]onsult the biblical map. . . [If your interpretation] is valid, it ought to ‘fit’ or ‘correlate’ with the rest of the Bible” (45). If someone’s interpretation does not match with the unity (meta-narrative) of the Bible, then they have a false interpretation. Their bad interpretation can and will lead to a bad application. That is why racism and other terrible things were backed up with Scripture for so long. It appears those believers (some of whom may not have been saved) did not understand the context of the passages they were using, and they did not verify that their theological principal matched the rest of God’s Word. When believers cautiously approach the text, recognizing that the unity of God’s Word is important, they can then more accurately interpret and apply Scripture. If they fail to do this, they will be unable to understand the meta-narrative of Scripture.

Works Cited

Duvall, J. Scott, et al. Grasping God’s Word: A Hands-On Approach to Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible. 3rd ed., Zondervan, 2012.

NASB. New American Standard Version. The Holy Bible. Lockman, 2013.

This article was originally written for Assignment 1-1 of The New Testament and Theology taught by Professor Joel Jupp (Moody Distance Learning)