The Exegetical Systematician: Scripture Isn’t Deficient, We Are

“It is here that the doctrine of the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit enters. And this doctrine is to the effect that, if faith in the Word of God is to be induced, there must be the interposition of another supernatural factor, a supernatural factor not for the purpose of supplying any deficiency that inheres in the Scripture as the Word of God, but a supernatural factor directed to our need. Its whole purpose is to remedy that which our depravity has rendered impossible, namely, the appropriate response to the Word of God. In this respect the internal testimony is co-ordinate and consonant with the Scripture itself. The Scripture is pre-eminently redemptive revelation; it is remedial of sin. The internal testimony is but another provision of God’s redempdve, and therefore supernatural, grace, directed to the correction of that which sin has effected.” —John Murray, “Fatih”