The Bible versus Higher Education

To destroy the validity of Scripture is to destroy Christianity. That is precisely why so many in academic circles seek to undermine the authority and the testimony to the complete verbal inspiration of the word of God. While it is one thing to see such an approach in the Religion Department of a secular university, such an attack is even greater and much more detrimental from the inside of supposedly Christian institutions. "Christian" in the description of a college or university breeds a trust among Christian students that they are learning in a Christian environment. However, a line must be drawn when the validity of Scripture is at stake. To this end, I've tried to compile a list of books that help explain the problem and/or give an adequate defense of Scripture:

The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel

The Great Evangelical Disaster by Francis Schaeffer

A Basic Guide to Interpreting the Bible by Robert Stein

A General Introduction to the Bible by Norman Geisler and William Nix

The Hermeneutical Spiral by Grant Osborne

Scripture and Truth by D. A. Carson and John Woodbridge

Hermeneutics, Authority, and Canon by D. A. Carson and John Woodbridge

The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible by B. B. Warfield

Christianity and Liberalism by J. Gresham Machen

Strobel's book gives a great summary of the documentary evidence for the historical validity of Scripture. Schaeffer's book adequately describes what it is stake for Christianity. Stein's book is subtitled "Playing by the Rules" appropriately because it demonstrates how interpretation must be done according to a standard. Geisler and Nix provide a great general overview of the issues. Osborne writes a detailed manual of interpretation. Carson and Woodbridge also provide trustworthy explanations of precisely how interpretation is to be approached. Warfield simply writes a classic (using no less than 4 languages) that serves to defend the Scriptures of the Christian faith. Machen, like Schaeffer, describes much of what is at stake, going so far as to describe those who adhere to anything other than Bible-believing Christianity as some other religion and "not Christianity."