The Baptist Confession of Faith
Of The Holy Scriptures
Chapter 1 Paragraph 7
28 June 2026
This afternoon we are tackling the next paragraph in the first chapter of the Confession of Faith that is not an addition to, certainly not a replacement of the Word of God, but it is what we believe to be an accurate and helpful summary of what the Word of God teaches. And the entire first chapter is written in such depth with 10 paragraphs to establish the importance, the significance, the centrality of the Bible. And that is what Chapter 1's title is Of the Holy Scriptures. And we're coming to another paragraph that deals with a key component on this subject. So let me first of all read what the paragraph says. It says:
All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed and observed for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of ordinary means, may attain to a sufficient understanding of them.
And that's the end of the paragraph. Now what we're dealing with in a paragraph like this, if it can be summarized accordingly, the message of the Bible is so easy to understand that a child of a very young age can grasp and believe while at the same time it is so complex that the greatest minds and intellects fail to comprehend. In 2 Peter 3:16 it ends saying, “There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures”.
So, what are we dealing with in a paragraph like this? Well, it is when you are presented with a text in the Bible, perhaps at times you have been thinking, wondering, saying and asking, well, what is this all about? Perhaps some of you reading this morning's text in Amos Chapter 9, you read through that and were thinking, well, what's all that about? And sometimes that can be the case. Other times we are presented with parts of the Bible, teachings in the Bible that we read, and we think, yes, this is something that I do understand. Now, as those who know the Bible as the Word of God, we are to come to search and to know the Holy Scriptures, being aware, as this paragraph is saying, that all things in Scripture are not alike, plain in themselves.
And this is something that we would all quickly recognize. Some things are more complex than others. Some texts are harder than others. And texts will be harder for some compared to others. Hence the need for the Bible to be taught and explained to help us to understand. Now what this paragraph is driving home with clarity and this is something that especially in the time of its writing when there was much of the Bible which was not being taught or misunderstood is that the Bible should not leave people feeling tied up in knots and having no idea what it's all about. So, the Bible shouldn't be being read and you're left thinking, well, I don't know what any of this is about.
Now this is taking us to a key theme that we've been dealing with recently in the end of Hebrews Chapter 5, regarding the subject of spiritual milk and solid food. Because for each of us, in order to understand what the Bible is all about, that doesn't mean that you need to give an accurate summary of what all 66 books of the Bible are about in terms of their history, context, meaning, intention and so on. But when it comes to the Bible as a whole, as the revealed Word of God, there should be an understanding this book is God's Word and it reveals a message, a message that brings life. And that is where we have the spiritual milk of the Word, which is something that everybody needs to know in order to understand the Gospel and to be saved. So, when, for example, the jailer in Acts 16 asks the question, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” You wouldn't be saying, well, you need a bachelor degree in divinity to understand and therefore answer that question. You need to be able to memorize set amount of portions of Scripture in order to be able to make sense of how one can be saved and to have a deep enough level of understanding of soteriology.
But at the same time, you as a professing Christian should want to move in that direction. Namely, as you understand the main message of the Bible, the life-saving message of the Gospel, and you believe it, which is that picture of spiritual milk that you consume, then you have a desire to know more of the complex things in Scripture, that which would require being more learned and require more searching and studying. So, permit me to give you this analogy. Your faith as a believer, your trust in Christ is a resting in the strength, the power, the beauty, the majesty of one that you cannot fully comprehend, but you truly believe Him. And upon truly believing Him, that simple faith in the pure gospel, by that faith, you devote your life to knowing and searching more of the one you know you trust. So, it is simple enough that you have that faith where you know you were once blind, but now you see. But knowing also this is complex, with that now you can see you have a desire to search and know the complex things of the Bible.
So, this is what is meant when it says “All things in Scripture are not plain alike in themselves, nor alike clear unto all, yet, crucially, those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other”. And this is what we're going to spend just the last few minutes considering the latter stages of this paragraph, what are the things that are clearly propounded?
What are the things that you need to know about the Bible? Now the first thing to state as we do this is to establish, we need to have a systematic understanding of biblical doctrine. It's no good to just flip open the Bible and, look, I'm in Hosea today, I'll pick a verse and see what that might mean today. Tomorrow, I'll flick it open and I'm in Romans and I've got something else and I'll see what that means. That has no systematic grounding and you don't get even the basic pillars of the Christian faith revealed in Scripture known and understood that way. So, this is why when we're dealing with these things that are plain, even for the unlearned to understand. That's not to say that, we can just kind of dip in and we'll just make sense of it as we please. There still needs to be a clear structure of understanding from what we find in the Bible.
In Deuteronomy, the Lord declares in Chapter 30 verse 11 “For this commandment that I command to you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off”. And the Lord has decreed it that way to reveal certain clear and foundational truths just by the basic reading of Scripture. So, let's consider some of these. First of all, what is plain in Scripture is the existence of God. So, the Bible makes it clear that there is the existence of God who is the Creator, who made all things perfect in His image and his attributes are revealed in Scripture. We may not be able to have a full understanding of these attributes, but we see that God is the God whose power is absolute, whose knowledge is absolute, the one who is present everywhere, who is infinite and everlasting, has no beginning, no end. These doctrinal truths reveal to us a God who is all-encompassing, all-powerful, glorious and wondrous. So, we have the revelation of God and what is plainly made known in Scripture is this God. Now there's much complex teaching about God to explore but this basic, what is plain to be made known is the Bible reveals that there is this one true glorious God.
Then another key point that needs to be stressed with the world that God has created, we see that it is an afflicted world. A world that has suffering and pain. And this is an important thing to establish because all throughout the Bible, all throughout history, and all throughout our lives, we face pain and suffering and anguish. And the Bible makes it clear why? It is because of sin. So, this is another thing that is made plain in the Word of God. That is that We were made perfect in God's image, but we sinned against God. We have turned our back on our Creator, and therefore the consequence of our sin is that we're cut off from God and we are condemned to eternity in hell. That is man's sinful condition, which is made clear throughout the Bible.
This is why another thing that is made clear in the Bible is that God has given His law and His law reveals His moral character. And this is important to understand because the law reveals how we are to live. We have the Ten Commandments, God's moral law, enabling us to see how we are to live in relation to God and with one another, how we are to function and how we can flourish. So, the law reveals who God is and his moral character and it also therefore reveals who we are as sinful people. Because the law condemns us. And that is why in the New Testament it is described as the ministry of death. Because as we stand before God's law, we cannot look at the Ten Commandments, look at what God has revealed and think tick tick tick tick tick, I pass for heaven. No, the Ten Commandments reveal that we are not fit for heaven, that we are guilty of violating each of these commandments.
And this is why what is crucially made plain in the Bible is the Gospel. Now again, the Gospel is a subject that can be delved into in much depth and rich teaching. But the core basic, glorious spiritual milk teaching of the Gospel, which is the answer to the source, what must I do to be saved, is the message that God has become a man and come to this earth. How we fully understand that is difficult to comprehend, but this is what is made plain. God has come to this earth as a man. And unlike us, though He is physically as we are, He is not morally as we are. He is spiritually perfect. He is without sin. And the key core message of the Bible is that this God-man, Jesus Christ, lived a perfect life that He would lay down that life sacrificially for sinners like us. And that's the key point. That's why we need the Bible, because it reveals how we can be saved. How can any of you be saved? Well, we open up our Bible and we see and behold Jesus Christ and we see that He has taken upon Himself the sins of His people and for all who repent of their sin and believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour, they will be saved. That is the message of the Gospel revealed in the Bible.
Now these are the things that are made plain and just as we finish, many people will try to blame or attack the Scriptures saying, oh well they're confusing or they're untrue, some parts of it, I don't believe them. And what we have to be emphatic in declaring is that the problem is not with the Bible, the problem is with us. Even with regards to the simplicity of the Gospel, many will hear this simple, unadulterated, spiritual milk proclamation Gospel and they'll reject it. Some will overcomplicate it. Some will very clearly misunderstand it. And so often with such folly and blindness, we see this in the Scriptures.
In Matthew 22:29, Jesus answers the Sadducees saying, “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God”.
But as we see from this opening chapter on the Holy Scriptures, it is the Spirit of God who is the one who gives us the eyes to see and the ears to hear. And that's what we can rejoice in tonight, brothers and sisters. This blind man who can see, who now sees, savors and cherishes this treasure chest of the Word of God. including having a yearning to know and search the deep and complex matters of Scripture, whether it be covenant theology, eschatology, the significance of the priesthood, all of these things which are more complex and difficult for us to explore, we do so on the basis of what is plain to us by what the Spirit of God has revealed. And this is why the confession goes through paragraph after paragraph dealing with the authority and the inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures. Some which are complex as this paragraph addresses but there is that which is plain for even the unlearned to see and to know and the seeing and the knowing of the unlearned the life-saving message of the Gospel, the truth of the Bible is, as we've seen already, a work that the Spirit of God does. Let's pray together.
Heavenly Father, we come to you in prayer and we ask, may you help us, equip us, strengthen us to understand more of what the Holy Scriptures reveal that are plain for learned and unlearned people to know and understand. Yet we yearn for your Spirit to work and to reveal such truths, to have a hunger and a desire to know and to grow upon such a foundation. Build us up, we pray, as children of the living God, that we may grow in our knowledge, our trust, and our understanding of the Scriptures. We thank you that in this confession of faith, it begins by establishing the authority of these Scriptures. And we pray that this would be the foundation of our lives, by which our lives are governed and shaped, for your honour and glory. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
STUDY QUESTIONS
1. What is 'clear' in the Bible? This should be something everyone can explain?
2. Can you articulate the Gospel as though speaking to someone who is hearing about Christianity for the first time?
3. How can the balance be struck between teaching the simplicity of Biblical truth but guarding against the danger of over-simplifying Biblical truth?
4. What should be our attitude towards complicated doctrinal subjects? What practical steps can be taken to grow?
5. Discuss the importance of a 'systematic theology' in being able to search, read and know the Holy Scriptures.