Introduction
Are there words we use to defend Christian truth that aren’t found in the Bible? Should that concern us? In this thoughtful conversation, we explore words like Trinity, inerrancy, and consubstantiality—terms that don’t appear in Scripture but have long helped the church guard its teaching and combat error. Learn why these extra-biblical terms matter, especially when heresies arise, and how the faithful have always used human language to protect divine truth. This episode is an encouragement to treasure the theological tools handed down to us—and to use them wisely.
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Transcript
Wim Kerkhoff 00:09
What are maybe six to ten words that aren’t in the Bible that help protect its meaning? And this has come up a few times in our theology study recently, right? So I thought, hey, let’s record this. What are those handful of words for
Pastor Jim Butler 00:21
the Trinity and this? Okay, okay,
Wim Kerkhoff 00:25
yeah. I guess there’s other words, like inerrancy, there’s canon, there’s yeah, there’s the Omni words and, yeah, yeah.
Pastor Cam Porter 00:30
Well, with that question, yeah, the first word that immediately comes to mind is the word Trinity. That’s the word not used in the Bible outside of the Bible, which of probably the the entire list that that is probably the most important one. And you know, it reflects the the Christian church articulating what the Bible says in order to to protect what the Bible says, and usually in these sorts of cases against error, words, words like this, that are that are given, words like Trinity, that are given by men, are usually forged within the fires of controversy. And so they’re faced with those who are opposing what the Bible teaches. And so they use words outside of the Bible to protect what’s in the Bible. And Trinity is a perfect example in order to it’s a blessed word that reflects the reality that the Bible teaches that there is one God who does eternally exist as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And it’s a very helpful word to not only positively present the doctrine of God, but also negatively, apologetically and polemically defend the truth that the Bible, that God Himself reveals in the Bible that he is one and he is he is one in one sense and three in another sense.
Pastor Jim Butler 02:11
If you’re just asking for a list of words with the assumption that people are going to go find the meanings, I would say when it comes to Trinity discussion, yeah, inseparable operations, appropriations, missions, notions, consubstantiality, the omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotentence, not a lot again, the illiteracy on the doctrine of God. It’s really, it’s, it’s not justifiable. You know, we’re the Saturday morning book we’re presently studying is Scott Swain’s introduction to the Trinity. I did a page count the other day. It’s 137 pages. I mean, we have all these modern conveniences. We got phones that do everything. We got washing machines that don’t happen to be our wives. We got dishwasher we can’t find time to read 137 page book. Partitive exegesis is another one. Part of exegesis definitely. Look that one up.
Wim Kerkhoff 03:19
I haven’t learned that one yet in the few years of theology.
Pastor Jim Butler 03:23
Basically, it’s ascribing to Christ, the one person of Christ and two natures. He does things according to his humanity. He does things according to His divinity. That’s part of the exegesis. So you’re familiar with the concept. You just didn’t know that identifier.
Pastor Cam Porter 03:38
And Jim mentioned consubstantiality, after the Trinity, after the word Trinity, that’s probably one of the most important words in the history of the church, and the use of an extra biblical term like that, or a word outside of the Bible, what we have seen in the history of the church is that heretics error risks. Those who oppose truth very often oppose the use of extra biblical words, and one of the reasons that they oppose them is that they can’t then dishonestly handle the Word of God. Because at the time, for example, of the Nicene Creed, one of the points of opposition by the Arians was the use of words outside of the Bible to protect what was inside of the Bible, the defenders of Nicene theology, or we could simply say the defenders of Christianity, the defenders of truth of what the Bible says. Very quickly learned that the Arians, for example, and the radical Arians, the enomians that would follow them, were using the Bible using, you know, the simplicity we could say, the naked words of the Bible in order to try to articulate and defend their heretical notions of what they thought the truth was. And obviously they’re mishandling the Bible in so doing and not articulating what the Bible what God in His Word is actually communicating. But the defenders of truth very quickly realized that, you know, God has given us language. He has given us His Spirit and the use of our words in order to articulate what the Bible says with regards to important aspects of doctrine. And you know, if we just simply think about the act of preaching, you know, if we weren’t, if we weren’t allowed to use words outside of the Bible, we would never be able to preach a sermon. We wouldn’t be able to pray to God in any way other than by words which are inside of the Bible. And so God expects and anticipates and we might even say in the scriptures that we have apostolic command to use words outside of the Bible to protect it, earnestly contend for the faith, which was once for all, delivered to the saints. And so words like this are are absolutely important, and we have received throughout the centuries a theological grammar that has been handed down to us by men who have vigorously defended the truth against error.
Pastor Jim Butler 06:30
I’d say causes and consequences too, when you get to justification, what’s a cause, what’s a consequence? Basic terms, yeah, what? Yeah, basic stuff. You know, so many of our problems in theology are bypassing basic stuff. Am I justified because I believed? No, I’m justified through faith in the object believed on. There’s a causes and consequences, or causes and effects, or, you know, the big stuff.
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