As Christians, we believe that the Bible is the inspired inerrant Word of God. This means that the Bible is free from error and is completely true and trustworthy in all that it teaches. The doctrine of inerrancy is essential to the Christian faith because it affirms the authority and reliability of the Bible as the foundation of our beliefs and practices.

Unfortunately, there are some professing Christians and professing Christian ministers who reject the doctrine of inerrancy and instead promote dangerous heretical ideas about the Bible that are inconsistent with the Bible itself. One such individual is Andy Stanley, a well-known pastor and author who not only denies the inerrancy of the Bible, but has even gone so far as to suggest that the Old Testament is irrelevant to modern believers.

These heretical teachings are not simply misguided, but as mentioned above, they are also dangerous. When we reject the inerrancy of the Bible, we are effectively rejecting the authority and reliability of God’s Word. We are saying that the Bible is not truly the Word of God, but is instead just a collection of human writings that may contain errors and contradictions.

But the Bible itself affirms its own inerrancy. The Bible tells us that “all Scripture is God-breathed” (2 Timothy 3:16) and that “no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation” (2 Peter 1:20). This means that the Bible is not just a collection of human writings, or even the writings of inspired men, but is the very Word of God himself. And because God is truth (John 14:6), his Word is also true and trustworthy.

In addition to the Bible’s own teaching on its inerrancy, there are also many other reasons to believe in the inerrancy of the Bible. For example, the Bible has been meticulously preserved throughout history, with thousands of manuscripts that demonstrate its accuracy and reliability. And even when scholars have examined the Bible and sought to find errors or contradictions, they have consistently been unable to do so.

Furthermore, the doctrine of inerrancy is essential for the preservation of the gospel. The gospel is the good news that Jesus Christ came to save us from our sins and reconcile us to God (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). The gospel is the central message of the Bible, and if the Bible is not inerrant, then the gospel itself is called into question. But because the Bible is inerrant, we can have confidence in the truth of the gospel and trust in its power to save.

In conclusion, the doctrine of inerrancy is essential to the Christian faith. It affirms the authority and reliability of the Bible as the inerrant divinely authoritative Word of the one true and living God. Those who reject the doctrine of inerrancy, such as Andy Stanley, are promoting arrogant heretical ideas that are dangerous to the Christian faith. We must stand firm in our belief in the inerrancy of the Bible and defend it against those who would seek to undermine its authority and trustworthiness.