RATIONALISM;
TEXTUALISM; HOLY SPIRIT: ILLUMINATION

But revelation is not enough! There must be illumination before revelation can get to a person’s soul. It is not enough that I hold an inspired book in my hands. I must have an inspired heart. There is the difference, in spite of the evangelical rationalist who insists that revelation is enough.…

In His day, Christ’s conflict was with the theological rationalist. It revealed itself in the Sermon on the Mount and in the whole book of John. Just as Colossians argues against Manichaeism and Galatians argues against Jewish legalism, so the book of John is a long, inspired, passionately outpoured book trying to save us from evangelical rationalism—the doctrine that says the text is enough. Textualism is as deadly as liberalism.

John 4:23–24; John 8:31–32; John 14:26; John 16:13–15; 1 John 2:20

Faith Beyond Reason, 22, 24.