How To Know The Bible's True Series

How to Know the Bible's True

Selected Passages

By Jim Wallace, Th.M.

Pastor, Risen King Community Church

November 13, 2016

One of the most important and debated questions in all of life is whether the Bible is true, whether it is what it claims to be, the very inspired Word of God. I struggled with this question from my youth, and for a number of years did not believe it to be the Word of God. But I soon came across some startling proofs, and I don't use the word proofs lightly—absolute proofs for any thinking and objective person that the Bible, the Old and New Testament, is literally true—it is absolutely the Word of God.

Now this morning, I'm going to give you plenty of information that, in my view, will prove to you beyond a reasonable doubt, that the Bible is absolutely true, the very Word of God, that it claims to be. Now we don't have time for all the evidence. But I'm going to demonstrate specifically that the Bible has been proven to be the Word of God in every conceivable way—historically, mathematically, scientifically, archeologically. And I’m going to explain that this morning by showing how the Bible demonstrates its absolute truthfulness thru fulfilled prophecy and mathematics, hard science, archeology and even modern medicine.

Now I must confess to you that at one time I believed the Bible to be a book full of myths and fables, a book that was created by our pre-scientific ancestors to explain what could not be explained prior to our age of scientific enlightenment. I believed that stories like the Creation account and Adam and Eve, the dividing of the Red Sea and Jonah and the Whale were all inventions of some human's imagination and had no basis in fact. I was a thorough-going evolutionist who believed that there were natural explanations for all that has occurred through history.

But the one of the first things that absolutely changed my view on these things was the incredible fact of fulfilled Bible prophecy. Ancient Hebrew prophets predicted in precise detail some of the major events of human history hundreds and sometimes thousands of years before they came to pass.

So how do I know the Bible is true: Point #1: The Bible's ancient prophecies have come true in exacting detail.

What's so interesting about this fact is that it is the very thing that God Himself points to in order to demonstrate that He is alone God among all the so-called gods that we have become acquainted with. In Isaiah 44:6-7, God, speaking through Isaiah, 700 years before the coming of Christ, said, “Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts:

‘I am the first and I am the last,

And there is no God besides Me.

‘Who is like Me? Let him proclaim and declare it;

Yes, let him recount it to Me in order,

From the time that I established the ancient nation.

And let them declare to them the things that are coming

And the events that are going to take place.'"

So, it's right there in verse 7: The God of the Bible says, "Who is like Me? Let him proclaim and declare it . . . and let them declare to them the things that are coming and the events that are going to take place." God is saying the fact that He is the one and only God of all creation can be proved by just one fact—predictive prophecy--the fact that He can declare the future before it happens and do so with absolute accuracy. This is absolute the signature of God upon His Holy Book, the Bible. And He essentially dares any other so-called god or false god to match Him in this unique ability, and none ever has.

I first became aware of this incredible proof of the supernatural nature of the Bible when I read the little paperback Science Speaks by Peter W. Stoner. Stoner, a mathematician at Westmont College, along with his college students, did a scientific and mathematical analysis of a number of different prophecies found in the Old Testament which were precisely fulfilled. The most impressive of these analyses had to do with prophecies about the coming Jewish Messiah which were ultimately fulfilled in the life of Jesus Christ. First, he analyzed just eight prophecies concerning Christ's coming, such as the fact that He would be born in Bethlehem, would have a forerunner who announced beforehand His coming, and would be betrayed for exactly 30 pieces of silver. Between Stoner and his students, they came up with scientifically determined conservative estimates that just these eight prophecies might have been fulfilled accidentally, or by chance, by any man who ever lived. The probability turns out to be one in 1017. That's one chance in ten with 17 zeroes behind it! Stoner then compared this with filling the entire state of Texas three feet deep with silver dollars, checking one of those Silver Dollars red, and sending a blind-folded man into it and having him pull out the red-checked silver dollar on his first attempt.