What does the Bible have to do with the Church?  Does the Bible come from the Church?  Or does the Church flow from the Bible?  On the surface, it would seem to be a “chicken or the egg” kind of question.  But understand the Bible as God’s word will help understand the relationship of the Bible to the Church.

Is the Bible just a collection of stories and rules / regulations?  No.  The Bible is God’s self-revelation of the reality of Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  And the function of that revelation is to make something happen.  The function of the revelation of God in the Bible is to communicate the reality of God’s self-revelation as a gift.  This gift is God’s work of reclaiming for himself that which he created.  Namely – you.  And that work of reclaiming or “salvation” is accomplished through the Son, Jesus Christ sent by the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit.  The individual hearing the Word proclaimed, when and where the Spirit wills it, is judged by that Word of God: revealing truths about the individual hearer – as a sinner under God’s judgment.  In that judgment, the individual is either transformed (killed in repentance and made alive again as God’s child in Christ), or rejects it outright.  The Bible is the agent of God’s divine action in the world because it is a testimony of God’s agent of salvation in the world: Jesus Christ.

God’s self-revelation (the Bible) is external to those hearing it.  It isn’t made up by someone.  God comes from outside the world in Christ, and by his action through Christ, creates something from nothing: a child of God from a sinner as good as dead in his/her trespasses and sin.  God is the external Creator, the hearer of God’s world is the child and the one created.

And the relationship between God and the Christian he has formed for himself is the analogous to the relationship between the Bible and the Church.

The Church is not simply a social gathering of people.  It is different from all other gatherings of people (clubs, meetings, political parties, etc), because it is called into being by God’s Word.  But the Bible doesn’t just prescribe a Church, and boom, it happens.  The Bible doesn’t just give detailed instructions on how it is to be managed or structured.  Nor is a set of rules and regulations for the Church written by the Church for its own good.  No, the Church is the gathering of those who hear God’s Word - that comes from outside itself – that is “external.”  It is the place where God speaks to the Church by means of the Bible.  Just as God revealed himself in Jesus, Jesus is revealed today by means of the testimony to Jesus – the Bible.

And like the individual being challenged and judged by the Bible, so the Church is confronted by the Bible.  The Church is told truths in its hearing of God’s Word that it doesn’t necessarily want to hear.  The hearing Church repents and then is re-formed – made stable and alive again by Spirit-given faith in the promises of God in his Word.  This doesn’t happen just once.  It takes place every time the Church hears the Word.  And recognizing God’s Word as God’s revelation of himself, that it has God’s authority, the Church obeys that Word.  Thus the preaching, teaching, liturgical orders, and writings of the Church are formed and shaped and flow from the Bible.  The Church that hears God’s Word then speaks that same Word to the rest of the world, so that more may be killed and made alive again by God’s Word.

The Bible and the Church are not in an equal relationship.  One is formed and shaped by the other.  One “gives birth” to the other.  The Bible is not simply the “language” of the Church.  No, the external Word of the Spirit of God constantly gives birth to, challenges, shapes, and makes holy a spiritual community belonging to God himself.