Devotional 7: The Clarity of Scripture: A Book the Plowboy Can Read

The Confession Read

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 the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

— Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 1, Section 7

Introduction: A Book the Plowboy Can Read

There is a question that troubles many sincere believers, and it is one the Westminster Divines anticipated with great pastoral tenderness. If the Bible is the Word of God — if it carries the authority of the Almighty and contains the whole counsel of God for salvation, as we saw in Section 6 — then why is it so difficult to understand? You have felt this difficulty. You may have felt it this very morning. You opened your Bible to the book of Leviticus and found yourself lost in a thicket of ceremonial laws. You turned to the prophecy of Zechariah and wondered what those strange visions of horsemen and lampstands could possibly mean. You read Paul's letter to the Romans and stumbled over sentences so dense with doctrine that you had to re-read them three times — and still felt the ground unsteady beneath your feet. And perhaps, in those moments, a whisper crept into your heart. A whisper that said: "This book is too hard for you. You need someone to explain it — someone with learning, someone with authority over the text. You cannot understand it on your own." That whisper, beloved, is the voice of an ancient adversary, one who has always sought to separate the people of God from the Word of God. He began in the garden with the question, "Yea, hath God said?" and he has been asking variations of it ever since. The Westminster Divines heard that whisper roaring through their own century, and they answered it with one of the most pastorally tender and theologically robust sections in the entire Confession. They teach us a truth that has set countless consciences free: the Scripture is both deep enough to occupy the greatest minds and clear enough to save the simplest soul. This is the doctrine of the perspicuity — the clarity — of Holy Scripture. It is not a doctrine that denies difficulty. It is a doctrine that insists that the difficulty never falls where salvation is at stake.

Scripture Foundation

The doctrine of the claritas Scripturae — the clarity of Scripture — is not an innovation of the Reformation. It is the testimony of the Word of God itself, speaking from the Law, the Prophets, the Psalms, and the Apostles. The Divines did not invent this truth; they discovered it already gleaming on every page. Psalm 119:105 — "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." The psalmist does not say that the Word of God is a floodlight illuminating the whole countryside at once. He says it is a lamp — a small, portable light that illumines the next step. In the ancient Near East, a lamp was an oil-filled clay vessel with a wick. It did not throw light for a hundred yards. It cast just enough glow to see where to place your foot next. This is a perfect picture of the clarity of Scripture. God has not promised to answer every question your curiosity might raise about angels or end-times chronology or the geography of Eden. He has promised to show you the way to walk. The lamp is sufficient for the path. You do not need to see the whole journey; you need to see the next step. And for that, the Word is bright enough. As John Calvin writes, the Scripture is like a lamp carried through the darkness — it does not make the entire world visible, but it makes the way of salvation unmistakably clear. Psalm 19:7 — "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple." Here is one of the most extraordinary claims in all of Holy Writ. The testimony of the Lord makes wise the simple. The Hebrew word for "simple" is pethi — it describes the inexperienced, the untaught, the person of open mind but little knowledge. It is not a moral condemnation; it is a description of those who lack formal learning. And what does the Word do for such a person? It makes them wise. Not merely informed. Not merely literate. Wise with the wisdom that leads to salvation, wise with the discernment that navigates the snares of a fallen world. This means that the simplest believer — the plowboy at his furrow, the mother at her hearth, the laborer at his bench — with an open Bible and a praying heart can attain to a wisdom that surpasses the learning of the philosophers. The testimony of the Lord is sure, and it makes wise the simple. William Tyndale famously told a learned priest, "If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more of the Scripture than thou dost." He was not boasting; he was confessing the perspicuity of Scripture. Deuteronomy 30:11-14 — "For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it." Moses is giving his farewell address to a covenant people about to enter the land of promise, and he anticipates a temptation that will plague the church in every generation. The temptation to think that God's will is inaccessible — remote, hidden, too lofty for ordinary comprehension. You need someone to ascend to heaven to retrieve it. You need someone to cross the sea to bring it back. You need a mediator, a priestly class, a magisterium. But Moses will have none of it. The word is very nigh unto thee. It is in thy mouth and in thy heart. God has not hidden His will in a celestial vault opened only by the keys of a priest. He has not deposited it in a language His people cannot read. He has spoken plainly, through Moses and the prophets, and His word is near — accessible, intelligible, clear. This is the Old Testament foundation of the very doctrine our Confession is teaching us. The Word of God is not far off. It is near. The lawgiver himself assures us of this, before Israel ever crossed the Jordan. The Apostle Paul picks up this very passage in Romans 10 and applies it to the gospel of Christ. The word of faith which we preach, he says, is the word that is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart. The clarity of God's revelation was already present in the old covenant, but it shines with particular brilliance now that Christ has come and the apostles have written. As we learned in Section 6, the whole counsel of God is complete in the Scriptures. Now we learn that this complete counsel is also clear — at least where it matters most. 2 Peter 3:16 — "As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction." This verse is the great biblical balance to the doctrine of perspicuity, and the Divines build it directly into the opening words of Section 7: "All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all." Peter, writing under the very inspiration of the Holy Spirit, acknowledges that Paul's letters contain things that are dysnoeta in the Greek — hard to be understood, difficult to grasp. The Apostle does not pretend that every passage of Scripture is equally accessible. He does not suggest that a child can read the book of Revelation and comprehend every symbol without help. But notice carefully what Peter says — and what he does not say. He does not say that these difficult passages concern things necessary for salvation. He does not say that the way of life is hidden among the hard sayings. He says that the unlearned and unstable wrest — twist, distort — these difficult passages to their own destruction. The problem is not that Scripture is unclear where it matters most. The problem is that sinful men take what is clear and distort it, and they take what is difficult and misuse it. Notice also what Peter calls Paul's writings: "the other scriptures." He places them on the same level as the Old Testament. And here is the comfort: if even apostolic writings contain things hard to be understood, and yet the gospel message is proclaimed with unmistakable clarity throughout those same letters — think of Romans 3, Romans 5, Romans 8, 1 Corinthians 15 — then difficulty in some passages does not obscure the clarity of the saving message. The main road is well-lit. It is the side-paths that grow dim. Nehemiah 8:8 — "So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading." After the return from exile, Ezra the scribe gathered the people of Israel — men, women, and all who could hear with understanding — and read the Book of the Law to them from morning until midday. The Levites stood among the people and helped them understand what was being read. This passage is precious because it illustrates the "due use of the ordinary means" that our Confession speaks of. The Word was read. The sense was given. The people understood. Notice the order: first, the reading of the text itself, distinctly and carefully. Then, the explanation of the sense. The Levites did not replace the text with their own teaching. They did not tell the people, "This is too hard for you; just listen to us and receive what we tell you." They read the Book of the law distinctly — clearly, with careful enunciation — and then they gave the sense so that the people could understand for themselves what God had said. This is what faithful preaching is meant to do: not to add to the Word or to replace the Word, but to open the Word so that the hearer can see with his own eyes what God has spoken. And this brings us to the very heart of the Reformed doctrine: the unlearned, making a due use of the ordinary means — the public reading of Scripture, the preaching of the Word, the mutual instruction of the saints, and above all the illumination of the Holy Spirit — can attain a sufficient understanding of everything necessary for salvation. Not everything in Scripture. Not every mystery of prophecy. But everything necessary. And that, beloved, is enough. John 10:35 — "The scripture cannot be broken." We have visited this verse in earlier sections, but it stands as a pillar beneath this one as well. If the Scripture cannot be broken, then it cannot be broken by obscurity either. It cannot be that God has spoken, and His speech is unintelligible. It cannot be that the Creator of language — the One who formed the tongue and the mind and the capacity for communication — has failed to communicate through language. The Scripture cannot be broken — not by the passing of time, not by the accumulation of human traditions, not by the supposed incompetence of the common reader. Consider the pattern of our Lord's own ministry. He appealed to Scripture as something His hearers could and should understand. He asked the lawyers, "What is written in the law? How readest thou?" — expecting them to give an answer. He rebuked the Pharisees not for failing to unravel obscure prophecies but for failing to believe what was plainly revealed about Himself in Moses and the prophets. He told the Sadducees that they erred because they knew not the Scriptures. The whole tenor of His teaching assumes that the Word of God is clear — clear enough to be believed, clear enough to be obeyed, clear enough to form the basis of judgment on the last day.

What the Divines Meant

To understand what the Westminster Divines were doing in Section 7, we must see the battlefield on which they were standing. The doctrine of the clarity of Scripture was not an abstract theological proposition to them. It was contested ground — and the souls of ordinary believers hung in the balance. The Roman Challenge Nearly a century before the Westminster Assembly, the Council of Trent had declared that Holy Scripture, while inspired, is not self-interpreting. According to Rome, the Bible is a dark and difficult book — a book full of obscurities that only the Church, guided by unwritten tradition and the teaching office of the bishops, can properly interpret. The Council's fourth session decreed that no one should dare to interpret Scripture "contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers" or against "that sense which Holy Mother Church has held and does hold." The practical effect of this teaching was — and remains — devastating. It means the ordinary believer cannot read his Bible and understand what is necessary for salvation. He needs the Church to tell him what it means. The Bible becomes a locked chest, and the Church holds the only key. As Heinrich Bullinger wrote in the Second Helvetic Confession, this is to "accuse the Holy Scriptures of obscurity" and to "make the Spirit of God guilty of falsehood, as if He did not know how to speak plainly." The Divines answered Rome not by denying that Scripture contains difficult passages — Peter himself had admitted this — but by insisting that the difficulty never falls where salvation is at stake. As Robert Shaw explains, "The Scriptures are plain in all things necessary to salvation. The way of life is so clearly pointed out that the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein." The Enthusiast Challenge But Rome was not the only adversary. On the other flank stood the Enthusiasts — the radical reformers and sectarians who claimed direct revelations from the Spirit that bypassed the written Word entirely. If Rome locked the Bible away from the people, the Enthusiasts effectively set it aside. They taught that the Spirit speaks inwardly, and that this inner word takes precedence over the outer word of Scripture. The Divines answered the Enthusiasts with the same doctrine of clarity, but from a different angle. They did not say that the Spirit is unnecessary for understanding — quite the opposite. As we saw in Section 5, "our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof, is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit." And as we saw in Section 6, "the inward illumination of the Spirit of God is necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word." The Spirit is essential. But the Spirit's work is not to reveal new truth beyond Scripture; it is to illuminate the truth already given in Scripture. The Spirit does not leap over the written Word; He works through it. He opens the eyes of the heart to see what is already there on the page. The "Due Use of the Ordinary Means" Perhaps the most pastorally important phrase in Section 7 is this: "in a due use of the ordinary means." The unlearned can understand the Scriptures — but not by snapping their fingers and demanding instant illumination. They must use the means God has appointed. What are these ordinary means? The public reading of Scripture. The preaching of the Word by faithful ministers. The diligent, prayerful private study of the Bible. The mutual instruction that happens when believers speak the truth in love to one another. The comparison of Scripture with Scripture. And above all, humble dependence upon the Holy Spirit, who alone can open blind eyes. As John Calvin teaches, the Word is clear, but we are blind — not because the light is dim, but because our eyes are darkened by sin. The Spirit does not make the Word clear; the Word is already clear. The Spirit makes us able to see the clarity that is already there. The Divines are teaching us that perspicuity is not an excuse for laziness. It does not mean that all understanding is effortless. It means that the effort, blessed by the Spirit and pursued through the ordinary means, will not fail to attain what is necessary. The thirsty man must still bend down to drink from the stream — but the stream is clear, and it runs at his feet.

Theological Depth

John Calvin and the Claritas Scripturae John Calvin was, in many ways, the theologian of the clarity of Scripture par excellence. Throughout his Institutes of the Christian Religion and his commentaries, he returns again and again to the conviction that God has spoken in such a way that His people can understand what is necessary for salvation. Calvin's argument is both theological and pastoral. Theologically, he argues that if God is the author of Scripture, and if God is both wise and good, then it would be unworthy of Him to speak in a way that His people could not understand. A God who cannot communicate clearly is not the God of the Bible. As Calvin writes in the Institutes: "Let this be a firm principle: God does not speak from heaven in order to involve us in perplexity, but to lead us to a certain knowledge of Himself." But Calvin's pastoral argument is even more powerful. He points to the experience of ordinary believers. The unlearned man who opens his Bible with prayer and trembling is not met with impenetrable darkness. He finds — sometimes to his own astonishment — that he understands. He sees the holiness of God in the Law. He sees his own sin in the mirror of the prophets. He sees the mercy of God in the Gospels. He sees the way of salvation in the epistles. As Calvin says, "The Scripture bears upon the face of it as clear evidence of its truth as black and white do of their color, sweet and bitter of their taste." Calvin was particularly fierce against the Roman argument that the church is necessary to interpret the Bible for the laity. He called this claim a "most pernicious error" and an "intolerable blasphemy." He wrote: "What, then, is the purpose of the Scripture if it is not to be understood? If the Spirit has so spoken that He cannot be understood, He has been a mocker of men rather than a teacher." The Spirit is not a mocker. He is a teacher. And the book He has inspired is a book that can be understood. Yet Calvin never denied that there are difficult passages. He was, after all, a commentator who had wrestled with every difficult text in the Bible. But he insisted that the difficulty is always on the periphery, never at the center. "In the bright and clear passages," he wrote, "the majesty of God is not only visible but conspicuously shines, so that no man of a sound mind and pure heart can be ignorant of the way of salvation." William Perkins and the Art of Prophesying William Perkins, the father of English Puritanism, developed Calvin's insights into a mature doctrine of biblical interpretation. In his classic work The Art of Prophesying, Perkins sets forth principles for understanding Scripture that flow directly from the conviction that the Bible is clear. Perkins draws a crucial distinction between the clarity of the text and the darkness of the reader. "The Scriptures," he writes, "are in themselves plain and easy to be understood. But the natural man perceiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him." The problem is not that the sun has gone dark. The problem is that we are blind. And the cure for blindness is not a better argument but a sovereign act of the Holy Spirit, opening the eyes of the heart. Perkins also taught that the clarity of Scripture means that every Christian has the right and duty to read the Bible for himself. He was one of the great champions of lay Bible reading in an age when it was still controversial. He argued that if Scripture is clear in things necessary, then the ordinary believer — not just the minister — can profit from its study. The minister's job is not to tell people what the Bible means instead of their reading it, but to help them read it better. Perkins' whole method of preaching, which shaped generations of Puritan ministers, was built on this foundation: explain the text, draw out the doctrine, apply it to the heart. Heinrich Bullinger and the Helvetic Confession Bullinger, Zwingli's successor at Zurich, embedded the doctrine of perspicuity in the Second Helvetic Confession of 1566, which became one of the most widely received Reformed confessions in Europe. His language is bold and unapologetic. The Helvetic Confession declares: "The Scripture is the Word of God, delivering the Holy Spirit's own instruction. If the Scripture is the Word of God, it is certain that the Word of God is not obscure. For God's Word, given to men, openly delivers heavenly doctrine, clearly reveals the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, and sets before us the whole Christ." Bullinger is making the same point as Calvin and Perkins, but with the crispness of a confessional statement: if God has spoken, He has spoken clearly. To deny the clarity of Scripture is to deny that God knows how to speak. Bullinger also anticipated the objection that there are many disagreements about what the Bible means, and he answered it with characteristic wisdom. "The fault of dissent," he wrote, "is not in the Scripture, but in men. The sun shines clearly enough, but the blind do not see it. The wine is good, but to a sick palate it tastes bitter. The fault is in the palate, not in the wine." These are not the words of a naive optimist who has never encountered a difficult passage. They are the words of a pastor who has seen too many ordinary believers transformed by the Word to believe that it is a book of darkness. Thomas Watson on Milk and Meat Thomas Watson, the sweetest of the Puritan writers, adds a beautiful pastoral dimension to the doctrine of clarity. He observes that the Scripture accommodates itself to every spiritual condition. There is milk for babes and meat for strong men. "The Scripture," Watson writes, "is a garden in which there is not only the tall cedar of lofty mystery, but the hyssop of plain truth, which the weakest Christian may gather." The image is lovely and precise. A garden contains plants of every height. Some truths tower above us, and we may never reach their full comprehension in this life. But other truths grow low, within reach of the humblest hand. And these low-growing truths — the sinfulness of sin, the mercy of God, the death and resurrection of Christ, the call to repentance and faith — are precisely the truths that are necessary for salvation. Watson also insists that the clarity of Scripture is one of the great proofs of its divine origin. "The Word of God," he says, "though deep in some places, yet in others is clear and intelligible to the meanest capacity. This shows it to be God's Word. If it were a human writing, it would be more obscure. But God, who is light, writes in such a way that the humble may understand." Francis Turretin on the Twofold Clarity Francis Turretin, the great Genevan scholastic, provides the most precise theological formulation of the doctrine. He distinguishes between what he calls the claritas externa — the external clarity of the text itself — and the claritas interna — the internal clarity that comes when the Spirit illumines the reader. The external clarity means that the words of Scripture, considered as words, are not obscure in themselves where matters of salvation are concerned. The sentences are grammatically intelligible. The concepts are not hidden behind coded language. God has used human language in its ordinary sense to communicate saving truth. But the internal clarity is equally necessary, and this is where Turretin avoids the rationalist error. A man may understand the grammar of Romans 3 and still not see his own sin and Christ's righteousness. The Spirit must illuminate the heart as well as the mind. Turretin also makes an important distinction that the Divines echo in Section 7: Scripture is clear — but "not alike clear unto all." The unregenerate man may comprehend the words but hate the message. The proud man may understand the syntax but refuse to bow to the authority. The lazy man may have the capacity but lack the diligence. As Turretin writes: "The sun is visible in itself, but not to the blind or to those who close their eyes or turn their backs to it." Robert Shaw on the Sufficiency of Clarity Robert Shaw, in his faithful exposition of the Confession, ties the doctrine of clarity closely to the doctrine of sufficiency that we studied in Section 6. If Scripture is sufficient — containing the whole counsel of God — but is not clear, then its sufficiency is a cruel joke. A full treasury that is locked is no comfort to the poor man standing outside the gate. Shaw writes: "The Scriptures are plain in all things necessary to salvation. They are a light shining in a dark place. The way of life is so clearly pointed out in them, that the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein." That phrase — "the wayfaring man, though a fool" — is drawn from Isaiah 35:8, and Shaw's use of it captures the pastoral heart of this doctrine. The clarity of Scripture is not for the academy. It is for the pilgrim on the road, the man who knows his own foolishness and yet needs to find his way home.

Puritan Application

Let us now bring these great truths down from the mountain of theological reflection to the level ground of our own souls. The doctrine of the perspicuity of Scripture is not a club with which to beat our opponents; it is a hand held out to the fainting pilgrim, a lamp offered to the traveler in the dark. First, do not be frightened away from your Bible by its difficult passages. You have met them. Every honest reader has. The genealogies of Chronicles. The visions of Ezekiel. The closing chapters of Zechariah. The argument of Romans 9 through 11. The symbolic world of Revelation. And when you meet them, the tempter will whisper: "You are not learned enough for this book. Put it down. Let the professionals handle it." But the Confession teaches you to answer that whisper. You are not required to master every difficult passage. You are required to know what is necessary for salvation — and that, beloved, is clear. The gospel is not hidden in the hardest chapters of the Bible. It is emblazoned across the easiest ones. As Thomas Watson says, there is milk for babes. Drink the milk. Feed on the clear promises of the gospel. Let the meat wait until your spiritual digestion is stronger. And as you grow, you will find — often to your surprise — that passages that once seemed impenetrable begin to open, because you are seeing them in the light of the whole counsel of God. Second, make diligent use of the ordinary means. The Confession does not promise that the careless reader will understand Scripture. It promises that "the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding." The ordinary means are the channels through which the Spirit ordinarily works. Do not neglect them. What does this look like in practice? It means attending upon the public preaching of the Word — not sporadically, but habitually, week by week, under a ministry that opens the Scriptures. It means reading the Bible privately, not in snatches but with discipline and prayer. It means reading good books by faithful teachers who have gone before you — commentaries, systematic theologies, Puritan paperbacks. It means discussing the Word with other believers, asking questions, sharing insights. The Ethiopian eunuch was reading Isaiah in his chariot, and when Philip asked him, "Understandest thou what thou readest?" he answered honestly: "How can I, except some man should guide me?" God sent him a guide. He still sends guides — pastors, teachers, authors, friends. The clarity of Scripture does not make human teachers unnecessary; it makes them more effective, because they are not creating meaning but uncovering meaning that is already there. Third, beware of two opposite errors: clericalism and individualism. Clericalism says that only the ordained can understand the Bible — that the laity must receive whatever the church tells them. Individualism says that the private reader, cut off from the church and its teachers and its confessions, is the only reliable interpreter. Both errors destroy the soul. The clericalist abandons his conscience to a human authority. The individualist abandons himself to his own pride, mistaking his private impressions for the voice of the Spirit. The Reformed way walks between them: every believer reads the Word for himself, under the illumination of the Spirit, in the communion of the saints, with the help of faithful teachers, and in submission to the whole counsel of God. Fourth, pray for the Spirit's illumination every time you open the Word. The clarity of Scripture is an objective property of the text — the meaning is there, on the page. But your ability to see it depends upon the Spirit's work in your heart. The sun may be shining in full strength, but if you are blind, you will not see it. The Spirit must open your eyes. As we learned in Section 5, our full persuasion of the truth of Scripture comes from the Spirit's inward work. The same is true of our understanding. Do not approach the Bible as a textbook to be mastered by intellect alone. Approach it as a living Word, to be received by faith, through the power of the Holy Ghost. Pray with the psalmist before you read: "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law." Pray with Paul that "the eyes of your understanding being enlightened" you may know the hope of your calling. This is not a prayer of desperation, as if the Bible were dark. It is a prayer of dependence, because your heart is dark — and only the Spirit can give it light. Fifth, do not use the difficult passages as an excuse to ignore the clear ones. This is one of Satan's oldest strategies. He cannot destroy the Bible, so he tries to distract you from its plain meaning. He points you to the one verse you do not understand so that you will neglect the hundred verses you do understand. He draws your eye to the obscure prophecy so that you will miss the clear command. Our Lord Jesus settled this matter with terrible clarity: "If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." The question is not whether you have solved every exegetical puzzle in the Minor Prophets. The question is whether you have obeyed what you already know. You know that you must repent. Have you repented? You know that you must believe in Christ. Do you believe? You know that you must forgive your brother. Do you forgive? You know that you must be holy. Are you pursuing holiness? The difficult passages will not be held against you on the day of judgment, for they are not the path of salvation. But the plain passages — the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, the gospel invitations of John and Paul — these you have read, and these will judge you. Do not let the obscure eclipse the obvious. Sixth, rest in the pastoral heart of God revealed in this doctrine. The clarity of Scripture is not merely a theological proposition. It is a revelation of the character of God. He is not a God who hides. He is not a God who speaks in riddles when your soul is at stake. He is a Father who wants His children to know Him, a Shepherd who wants His sheep to hear His voice, a King who issues His law in language His subjects can understand. Think of what it cost Him to speak clearly. He sent His Son, the eternal Word, to dwell among us, full of grace and truth. He sent His Spirit at Pentecost, not to produce ecstatic babble but to enable apostles to proclaim the mighty works of God in languages every hearer could understand. He presided over the writing of the New Testament in common Greek — the language of the marketplace, not the language of a scholarly elite. At every point, God has gone to infinite lengths to make His Word accessible. The clarity of Scripture is a blood-bought gift. Christ died not only to remove the guilt of sin but also to remove the veil that lies over the heart when Moses is read. In Him, the veil is taken away. Beloved, take your Bible in your hands. It is a book for you — not only for the scholar, not only for the minister, not only for the theologian. It is a book for the plowboy and the milkmaid, the mother and the merchant, the child and the aged. It is a lamp to your feet and a light to your path. It is milk for your infancy and meat for your maturity. It is the clear, living, powerful Word of the God who loved you and gave Himself for you. Read it. Trust it. Obey it. And let no one ever tell you that it is too dark to find the way home.

Prayer

Almighty and most gracious God, who didst speak light out of darkness and who hast shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of Thy glory in the face of Jesus Christ: we praise Thee for the Holy Scriptures, which are not a dark labyrinth but a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path. We bless Thee that Thou hast not hidden Thy will from Thy children, nor buried the way of salvation beneath unsearchable mysteries, but hast spoken plainly through Moses and the prophets, through Christ and the apostles, so that the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein. We thank Thee that that which is necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation is so clearly opened that even the simplest believer, using the means Thou hast appointed, may attain a sufficient understanding. Yet we confess, O Lord, that our minds are darkened by sin and our hearts are slow to receive Thy truth. The Word shines, but our eyes are dim. The trumpet sounds, but our ears are dull. Forgive us for every time we have read Thy Word carelessly, without prayer, without meditation, without the humility that receives the kingdom as a little child. Grant us the inward illumination of Thy Spirit, that we may not only read the words on the page but see the glory of Christ shining through them. Keep us from the pride that stumbles over hard passages while neglecting the plain ones. Keep us from the sloth that refuses the effort of study and the discipline of the ordinary means. Keep us from the despair that abandons the Bible because some parts are difficult. And keep us from the independence that sets aside the teaching ministry Thou hast given to Thy church, as if we needed no help to understand Thy Word. Raise up, we beseech Thee, faithful ministers who will read the Book distinctly, give the sense, and cause Thy people to understand. Raise up humble teachers who open the Scriptures without obscuring them. Raise up diligent hearers who search the Word daily, testing every teaching by what is written. And let the mutual instruction of the saints be so rich, and the public preaching of the Word be so clear, that no soul in Thy flock shall wander for want of light. And when we come to passages we cannot understand, grant us patience to wait upon Thee, contentment with what Thou hast revealed, and confidence that what Thou hast hidden belongs to Thee, while what Thou hast revealed belongs to us and to our children forever. Above all, we pray, draw us every day to the one great truth that is clearest of all: that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. In that truth we rest. In that truth we hope. In that truth we shall live and die, and in that truth we shall rise again on the last day. In the name of Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, who with Thee and the Holy Spirit livest and reignest, one God, world without end. Amen.