“BUT, WHAT IF I DO NOT ACCEPT THE BIBLE’S AUTHORITY?”

by Shawn Brasseaux

My dear friend, if you are visiting a foreign country, whether you “accept” that nation’s authority or not, you are still subject to its rules. If you break the law there, you will suffer the penalty—whether or not you agree with it. Here is how you should look at life on Earth.

Deep down inside, my friend, you know that you do not do that which you know you are supposed to do, and you know that you do that which you know you are not supposed to do. Here is your conscience, an internal system of norms and standards that governs your thoughts and behaviors. What are you going to do with that guilty conscience? Do some “good” works? How exactly does one compensate for bad works anyway? Is there some way to measure the “badness” of an evil work so that a “good” work of the same value can take its place and cancel it? But, what if the evil work is so terrible that many “good” works are needed to nullify it? What if, in the event you try to do good the next time, you commit another evil work in the process? Eventually, you realize you are fighting a losing battle, accumulating a debt you can never possibly pay!! Insanity has been defined as repeating the same action and expecting a different result. Maybe, just maybe, you had better look to someone beyond yourself to deal with your mounting guilt!!

The Holy Bible is an objective standard. It transcends everything subjective—feelings, hunches, opinions, and so on. Either we agree with it or we disagree with it. If we want to oppose it, we can indeed oppose it. However, we will hurt only ourselves. Sinful flesh discounts the Bible out of spite, nothing more. There was no careful investigation of facts, only a willful disregard of the facts already presented therein. The Bible has a negative view of us, so we (naturally) shy away from it and do what we can to “disprove” it. Here is how we know someone other than a person like us wrote it. A Divine mind is behind the Bible, and that conviction pricks us down to our very innermost being!

If man influenced the penning of the Scriptures, we would read page upon page upon page of how we can improve ourselves. There would be such boasting in those passages, and license for us to brag as well. We could praise ourselves, fall in love with ourselves, and exalt ourselves to some deified status. Yet, upon reading the pages of Scripture, we find the human race is condemned as Hell-bound sinners. This is most offensive, right? See, “religious” and “irreligious” alike, all are headed to a place of endless suffering under the righteous judgment of a holy God! Like it or not, friend, your guilty conscience agrees with the Bible. You can argue with it all you want, invent and jump through all the mental hoops you want, but you cannot get around it. You are guilty as charged in conscience and confirmed by Scripture—and what an unspeakable eternal penalty that guilt carries!

It is your eternal soul at stake, dear friend, not mine. If you prefer to refuse to submit to the Holy Bible, then you go right on ahead and rebel against it. No one will stop you or force you to accept it—not even God Himself. In the event that you are wrong, then you will have no one to blame but yourself for those consequences. Someone once wisely observed, “Some people tell God, ‘Thy will be done.’ God tells many people, ‘Thy will be done!’” It was true then and it is equally true now. If you are Hell-bent on your anti-Bible path, by all means, friend, you just keep walking it. You have made your choice, and we will not deny you your right. This is said in love. Here is another word of caution we will add. When you reach the “dead end” of your journey, you can look back and see where your decisions got you. You will not be able to repeat that life either. (Perhaps you should think twice before arriving at that end?)

Dear friend, when you are finally done “doing your own thing”—now disappointed, and feeling insignificant, hopeless, and helpless—just remember there was an answer in the Lord Jesus Christ that you refused. Furthermore, He will be there until your last breath, waiting for you to trust Him as your personal Saviour before it is eternally too late. When your seasonal pleasures in sin have departed, what then, friend? Will you still refuse to accept the Bible’s authority? When your guilty conscience is so vexing that you can bear it no longer, what then, dear friend? Will you still refuse to accept the Bible’s authority? (Do you really want to know? Your answer will likely be, “Yes, I will still refuse to accept the Bible’s authority.” The longer you refuse, the harder your heart grows, and the more difficult it is for you to receive the Word of God by faith. However, the God of Scripture values free will, so you just keep on doing what you feel like doing. The path is all yours, and yours alone!)

In closing, you should be reminded that it is not too late to turn around… yet.

“For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law” (Romans 3:23-28).

“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4).

“And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house” (Acts 16:31).

“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen”
(Romans 1:18-25).

Also see:
» What happens after death?
» Can an atheist be moral without any influence from any higher power?
» “If only I saw a miracle…?”