does this not create a duplicated ambiguity of terminology?
(Yes, I know that I am treading on the sacred ground of
bibliolatry, but I must press on!) On what basis do we refer
to the Bible as the "Word of God"? Is there anything within
the Bible itself that says that we are to refer to this book in
its collected totality as the "Word of God"? Is there any
Biblical justification for that designation?
I encourage you to make the same observations that I
did when I looked at an English concordance of the Bible
and searched out all the references to the word "word" and,
more specifically, references to the "word of God." Valid
exegetical analysis does not indicate that a single usage of
the phrase, "word of God," ever refers to the book that we
call "The Bible."
To further explore the basis of this popular designation
of the "word of God," I examined several Bible dictionaries
and encyclopedias looking up the subject of the "word of
God." To my amazement, not a one of them indicated that
the phrase referred to the Bible or the Scriptures. Rather,
they all explained that Jesus Christ is the personified
expression of God, the "Word" (John 1:1,14), and went on
to explain that the proclamation of God's expression in
Jesus Christ is the essence of the gospel. The good news of
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