Angry About Sola Scriptura

I don't post all of the comments that people leave on this blog. The reason for this is that some are very angry in tone. Interestingly, some of the angriest people are those who oppose the doctrine of sola scriptura (When I use the term "sola scriptura," I'm referring to the belief that scripture alone is authoritative for belief and practice).

I find the whole thing fascinating. I've written several posts dealing with sola scriptura, and almost every time a few folks leave comments that are clearly driven by anger. I suppose the reason for this is that sola scriptura opposes unbiblical traditions. We all know that people, regardless of denomination, do not like it at all when you call their favored traditions into question.

As far as I can remember, the angry commenters have almost all been Roman Catholics. This is no surprise in light of Rome's multitude of traditions that have no biblical basis. The interesting part is that these Catholics have all tried to use scripture to make the case that sola scriptura is not, in fact, biblical. This seems inconsistent to me. If they don't hold to sola scriptura, then why are they basing their arguments on scripture in the first place? It seems like they would refer instead to a statement from the Vatican about scripture and tradition both being authoritative.

The reality is that the bible can be an inconvenient book. It calls us to lives of self-sacrifice and suffering. In general, we don't like this. Instead, we create traditions around ourselves that make us feel comfortable. Roman Catholics are clearly guilty of this; this is why they despise the doctrine of sola scriptura. If Catholics suddenly adopted sola scriptura as true, they would have to immediately jettison many of their dearly held beliefs and practices.

Before we Protestants get too happy with ourselves, we had better be honest. Although we may say we believe in sola scriptura, we also have plenty of traditions that are based more on personal preference than on scripture. One example that I talk about quite a bit on this blog is church gatherings. What we see happen in most churches on Sundays bears little resemblance to what we see in scripture of the gathering of the church. Why the big difference? Traditions have developed over the years that we like. We don't challenge these.

I'll say this for Catholics: they are consistent. They say they don't believe in sola scriptura and act like they don't believe it.

We Protestants say we hold to sola scriptura, but we don't really act like we believe it. If we did, many of our traditions would quickly have to become extinct.

Instead of getting angry, let's be willing to really live according to sola scriptura. Let's compare all our beliefs and practices with what we see in the bible. Let's honestly keep what is biblical and get rid of the rest.

Let's be careful not to be like the Pharisees of Mark 7. In Mark 7:8, Jesus says, "You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men."

Let's reject traditions and instead truly hold to scripture alone.