The Unity of Scripture  How do most people characterize the Bible?  Is it like a novel or story?  Is it like a biography or textbook?  How does it all fit together?  "Many people hesitate before the Bible in much the same way they hesitate at the edge of a dense forest.“ S. Deitrich

The Unity of Scripture  How can two books be one Book?  How can 66 books be 1 book?!  How can we make sense of it all?

Our dilemma  Isaiah 55:8. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord.  We think differently, we have different perspectives.  Yet - He does not want us locked into this dilemma.  Hebrews He’s there and He has spoken

Our dilemma  The Bible is very diverse  We are faced with history, law, poetry, proverb, prophecy, parable, oration, epistle, and sermon  and then we’re expected to readily accept the idea that one continuous story is woven throughout all these varied writings.

The Big Picture  Have you really seen how all these diverse books fit together?  The Bible is not a "book" in the usual sense.  There’s not a logical “plot” like a novel, nor are the connections always clear like a textbook.

Unity?  Would you say the book of Psalms is an extension of or harmonizes with Joshua?  How do you put these two books together?  Can they be joined?  If so - What would be the key?  When you see how it all fits together, how it presents a unified message, it will help you to understand and use it effectively.

2 kinds of unity:  Organic  Functional  a piece of chalk and a ball-point pen  Which is organic and which is functional in its "oneness"?

The Bible  It has 66 distinct parts,  yet all function together to form one body of revelation.  Not sameness but unity.  It's not just that the individual books complement one another;  they need one another.

I Corinthians 12: 12ff  human body-church body analogy  If Esther shall say, “Because I am not Isaiah, I am not of the Bible;” is it therefore not of the Bible? And if Daniel shall say, “Because I am not Ephesians, I am not of the Bible;” is it therefore not of the Bible?

 If the whole Bible be prophecy, where would be the great convicting Law?  And if the whole Bible were worshipping hymns, where would be the great historical narratives?  But now hath God set the books of the Bible--each one of them--in the Bible, even as it pleased Him.

Think Bible  think Unity  think God  think Progress