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160 How Can We Know the Christian Scriptures Are True?
see light.” The reason even those who have no fear of God can live and
drink from the life of God is that God is the source of all life. There is
no life apart from God. And God is the source of all light. There is no
light, no knowledge, no wisdom, apart from God. All existence and
all knowledge depend on God. If we have life, we live by him. “In him
we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). If we have any
knowledge, we know by him. “From him and through him and to him
are all things” (Rom. 11:36). We do not shed light on him by the light
we see. He is the origin, the source. If we have any measure of light, it
is he who is shedding light on what we see, not we.
Thus when the Son of God came into the world—when the Word
became flesh (John 1:14)—“the true light, which gives light to everyone,
was coming into the world” (John 1:9). The original, the source,
became part of the stream of creation that flows from him. The light
entered the light that he created. Jesus Christ is unique. He is really creature,
and really Creator—one person in two natures. He is one who can
be known and the one who makes all knowing possible. He is a point
of light—a point of truth and knowledge—that enters our minds, and
he is the light by which we see all points of light. Thus we know him
to be true, not because our light shows him to be so, but because his
divine light shines with its own, all-enlightening, all-explaining glory.
And so it is with his word, the Scriptures, which are organically related
to the incarnate Word. As the light of the world, Christ is the sum
and brightness of all Old Testament truth. And he willed that the light
he brought into the world be preserved again as the sum and brightness
of the New Testament. As Herman Bavinck puts it, Scripture “is the
product of God’s incarnation in Christ and in a sense its continuation.” 6
Thus we know the Scriptures to be true, not because our light shows
them to be so, but because their divine light shines with its own unique,
all-enlightening, all-explaining glory.
What Did Peter See That Judas Did Not?
In our fourth illustration, I would like to reflect with you on the difference
between what the apostles Peter and Judas saw when they looked at
6
Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 1: Prolegomena (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic,
2003), 380.