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A review by jthornenj
God's Word Alone---The Authority of Scripture: What the Reformers Taught...and Why It Still Matters by Matthew Barrett
4.0
If you've ever wondered how the Bible is sufficient, and why it's undoubtedly God's written word, this is the book for you.
In the first three chapters, Barrett sets out the history of Sola Scriptura with the reformation, and the obstacles it's come across since.
In the second section, Barrett describes how through God's Word he gave covenants and how the trinity sets out the Word of God, as can be viewed in the written Word. Then he goes into creation and the fall, and ends this section with how Christ is the Word made flesh.
In the final section, he lays out how Scripture is inspired, inerrant, and clear and talks about it's sufficiency even today.
Throughout, he relays this information in response to schools of thought that have effected our view of Scripture, such as postmodernism. Overall, I thought this was incredibly well done, with many amazing references. Barrett wasn't afraid to call out, with references, theologians and scholars he felt were wrong in his footnotes.
However, at times it felt as though, if you weren't following the train of thought correctly, that he was stating the only reason thinking differently then him was wrong was because "this is what the reformers taught". Most times, it was easy to pull together the whole thought, and put scripture evidence behind it that he laid elsewhere, but especially near the end, it became harder, and felt as though we needed to think this simply because someone else did, without explaining why that's the correct way.
I get that this is a book with the subtitle "what the reformers taught . . . And why it matters", but it's also important to constantly put out "why it's correct", to allow for better dialogue should one disagree.
I'd highly recommend though, just know it is heavy, and took me quite a while to get through, but that may be because this is a topic that highly interests me. I am looking forward to picking up Faith Alone by Schriener in the near future. 9/10.
In the first three chapters, Barrett sets out the history of Sola Scriptura with the reformation, and the obstacles it's come across since.
In the second section, Barrett describes how through God's Word he gave covenants and how the trinity sets out the Word of God, as can be viewed in the written Word. Then he goes into creation and the fall, and ends this section with how Christ is the Word made flesh.
In the final section, he lays out how Scripture is inspired, inerrant, and clear and talks about it's sufficiency even today.
Throughout, he relays this information in response to schools of thought that have effected our view of Scripture, such as postmodernism. Overall, I thought this was incredibly well done, with many amazing references. Barrett wasn't afraid to call out, with references, theologians and scholars he felt were wrong in his footnotes.
However, at times it felt as though, if you weren't following the train of thought correctly, that he was stating the only reason thinking differently then him was wrong was because "this is what the reformers taught". Most times, it was easy to pull together the whole thought, and put scripture evidence behind it that he laid elsewhere, but especially near the end, it became harder, and felt as though we needed to think this simply because someone else did, without explaining why that's the correct way.
I get that this is a book with the subtitle "what the reformers taught . . . And why it matters", but it's also important to constantly put out "why it's correct", to allow for better dialogue should one disagree.
I'd highly recommend though, just know it is heavy, and took me quite a while to get through, but that may be because this is a topic that highly interests me. I am looking forward to picking up Faith Alone by Schriener in the near future. 9/10.