What is the Bible? (2 Peter 1:12-21)
Emperor Menelik II was an African ruler who defeated the Italian army at Adwa in 1896 and established the nation of Ethiopia. He believed that the Bible had the power to cure illness, and he would eat a few pages of it anytime he got sick. He suffered a stroke in 1913, after which he ate the entire book of Kings. As a result, his bowels became obstructed and he died of related complications.
If only we gave the Word of God that much credit today. Obviously, the power is not in the paper or ink but in the words that are spoken, and I believe this book is the powerful living Word of God. The words we read can heal, change people, and change the world. But not everyone agrees even amoung Christians.
If you take away the Bible, you’ve taken away the entire Christian message. Yet a lot of confusion exists today about the Bible. According to a 1996 Barna survey, 42% of North Americans say they believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. Yet almost half of us believe that the Bible is too hard for us to understand, so on any given week very few people actually read the book they claim to embrace as God’s literal word. Clearly there’s a discrepancy between what we say we believe and our true beliefs as demonstrated by our actions.
One of the main arguments people have against Christians is that we claim that the Bible is the Word of God, but other religions believe their book is the word of god. What makes your book better than their’s they ask. We tend to use the Bible to defend itself much like if we said that we are the president because we say so. Before I was a believer I used to hate it when people would answer questions I had about the faith with “the Bible says”. My very next question would be, “why do you believe the Bible, how can a book be God?” This is where many Christians would get stuck and not be able to answer. I think many Christians have never even really asked themselves why they believe the Bible. For many I am not sure it was even a conscious personal choice, but rather something just handed down to them, or something they were told was true, so they just assumed the people who told them it was true were right. We have the “Truth Project”coming up in a couple of weeks and I think it will be excellent in helping us know why we believe what we believe.
I admire this kind of “childish faith” that many people have, but unfortunately in our modern culture there is a lot more skepticism and questioning, people want to come to their own beliefs. Therefore I think it’s important that we really know how to answer questions about the Bible for ourselves and for others who ask. Remember without the Bible there is no Christian faith. It’s not a symbol of our faith, it is our faith, and I believe the need to know the Bible is more important than coming to church, getting baptized, praying, and every other Christian activity combined. The Bible is the only artifact of our faith that is entirely indispensable, and that is why I think God has made it literally impossible for the Bible to ever be wiped out of existence. There are more copies in more languages, that they could never all be destroyed. So helping others know about and understand the Bible is our most important evangelical activity, and the one that will create the most authentic believers.
I. Authentic
We don’t have time to get into an extensive apologetic discussion here, but we need to know some of the evidence for the Bible’s authenticity. How do we know it is authentic? Well, as in everything in science and history it is nearly impossible to prove anything as fact, but we can only state beliefs based on the real evidence we have. The conclusion that even atheist researchers have come up with is that of all the writings of antiquity, the Bible has by far the most originally preserved manuscripts that can be verified as historically accurate. This is just one of the many reasons we believe it is from God, because only God could have preserved such a vast variety of documents written over such vast amount of time and distance that fit together and verify each other so perfectly.
In the Scripture reading we see that Peter shows incredible dedication to the word in spite of the opposition. For me this is one of the biggest arguments for the validity of the Bible. These men all risked death to maintain the truth of what they were saying, it would have been so much easier to just forget it. I don’t know if I would have had the courage they did, so what they experienced must have been real.
The first proof we have testifying to the reliability of the Bible is the archaeological evidence. Nelson Glueck, a respected Jewish archaeologist claims: "It may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever contradicted a biblical reference." (6) The liberals made wild claims against the Bible a hundred years ago but now they are silent. This is not true of other religions. The Mormon claim for inspiration of the Book of Mormon has been categorically condemned by the Smithsonian Institute because of the fallacies shown by archaeology; this is not so with the Bible. A.N. Sherwin-White, a respected classical historian at Oxford says, "For Acts the confirmation of historicity is overwhelming...", although, not being a Christian, he still regarded it as being "propaganda."
Recent scientific evidence is adding to the evidence supporting the reliability of biblical chronology from the scriptures. This study demonstrated the reliability of the Biblical record regarding the Egyptian plagues and demise of Jericho.
Drs. Hendrik J. Bruins and Johannes van der Plicht reported in the prestigious British journal, Nature (14), that the destruction of Jericho was dated to 1580 (+/- 13 years) B.C. (using 14C dating). This date is significant, since several archeologists have insisted that Jericho was destroyed by the Egyptians between 1550 and 1300 B.C. The recent study discredits the Egyptian theory, since the date is much too old.
What is even more exciting is that scientists, using 14C dating and tree rings, have found evidence of a volcanic eruption from the Aegean island of Thera, which recently has been dated to 1628 B.C. (15). This would place the eruption at 45 years prior to the destruction of Jericho, at a time which coincidentally corresponds to the time of the plagues the Lord unleashed upon Egypt. Check out Exodus 10:
Then the Lord said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand toward the sky, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, even a darkness which may be felt." So Moses stretched out his hand toward the sky, and there was thick darkness in all the land of Egypt for three days. (Exodus 10:21-22)
Even the researchers commented that the 45 years difference in events was "rather striking."
The next proof is the Bible’s uniqueness and unity. The Bible was written by over 40 authors who came from just about every walk of life conceivable, including fisherman, kings, a butler, priests, and a tax collector. The 66 books of the Bible were written over a 1,500 year span in three languages on three continents with one theme and no contradictions. C.J. Sharp captures this miracle well:
• "If a fragment of stone were found in Italy, another in Asia Minor, another in Greece, another in Egypt, and on and on until sixty-six fragments had been found, and if when put together they fitted perfectly together, making a perfect statue of Venus de Milo, there is not an artist or scientist but would arrive immediately at the conclusion that there was originally a sculptor who conceived and carved the statue. The very lines and perfections would probably determine which of the great ancient artists carved the statue. Not only the unity of the Scriptures, but their lines of perfection, suggest One far above any human as the real author. That could be no one but God
Related to this is the incredible fulfillment of prophecy that is found in the Bible. Not only are the number of confirmed fulfilled prophecies staggering, but also the incredible detail with which some of them were described. Not one fulfilled prophecy has been proven to be inaccurate by scientific or archaeological means. Jesus and the New Testament writers quoted the OT so often that they certainly believed the OT was authentic. Christians for centuries have been quoting the New Testament, so the early Christian church must have believed it was authentic.
II. Inerrant (2 Peter 1:20-21, John 17:17)
2 Peter 1:20-21 say, "Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit"
We live in what is called a post-modern society, which has both good characteristics and some not so good. One of the characteristics of modern society is the belief that reality is based on our personal perception. To some degree this is true for our personal view of reality, but there must be some truth. I would listen to couples describe their argument in the counseling office and their descriptions would be so different, it was hard to believe they were in the same room. Certainly their reality of the situation was very different, but were either the truth? Never, but could that be proved without an eye witness? No. People blame those who claim to have the truth as arrogant and disrespectful, and Christians especially are put in this category because we claim that God’s word is the absolute truth and that the Bible is completely inerrant without any mistakes.
Peter is saying that prophecy, which is not just future prediction but the general revelation of God, was never from the prophets themselves or their interpretation of what God was saying. In fact, the prophets of the Bible knew that God would punish them severely if they did not speak His word accurately. This should be as true today as it was then if we really understand the enormous responsibility of preaching God’s word.
We need to remember that the Bible is literature, and as such much of it is written in story and parables not meant to be taken literally. This sounds like a cop out to those who don’t believe, how can you take some literally and some not, are you saying that some is fiction and some non-fiction, and who decides? Are we meant to take Mary Poppins literally? Neither should we blindly take the stories of the Bible literally. But they are making a point that can be irrefutable.
No person, has, will, or will ever be able to answer this question either way. If we look at the very nature of God and what He wants for his people, we are asked to have faith that the Bible is His word, and if He is truth, then we must find that His word is truth. But He also says that no human can understand Him and his ways. Throughout history he has asked us to have faith. Even when He proved His existence through amazing miracles that everyone could see, many would not believe. Clearly he has no intention of letting us prove anything about Him this side of heaven. He asks us to have faith or trust that what He says is true, not to prove it. Many Christians have their own proof, but it would never stand up to scientific scrutiny. So really the best answer to give about this in my opinion is “see for yourself”. Can you really know if you will like your new job unless you actually go and do the job? The only way to know if God’s Word is the truth is by experience, therefore you have to try it on wholeheartedly for an unlimited amount of time if you really want the answer. Even then you still might not get it in this lifetime.
One other way to help others who don’t believe that the Bible is true is to ask them if they believe what God says in the ten commandments. This is the only part of the Bible that was written directly by God’s hand in stone. Very few people would argue that most of the commandments are a good idea. That goes for most other principles in the Bible. So if we look at principles rather than literal interpretation, many people will have an easier time. Aside from all of this, don’t try too hard to prove anything in the Bible, that is God’s job through the Holy Spirit. All we can do is say why we believe it is true and perhaps show the evidence from what we heard about authenticity in the previous point.
III. Inspired (2Timothy 3:16)
Inspired is the term we most often use to describe the writers of Scripture, but the Word itself is actually “expired” or “God Breathed” as stated in 1 Timothy. Once again people will ask, “how do you prove that these people were inspired and not all the others that have written about God?” Again much of our answer comes from the Bible itself. 66 books were chosen for the Canon by people in the early church, and there has been disagreement over the years. However, the church has agreed for over 2000 years that what we have as the Bible is what was meant to be the Bible. The Old Testament Scripture was thought to be the word of God long before Christ came, and the books of the New Testament were rigorously examined on several criteria including when they were written and whether the writers had eyewitness accounts of the life of Jesus, before they were included.
There are other books that the Catholic church includes in it’s Old Testament, called the Apochrypha or “hidden books”, and many think this has been so since the time of Christ. The truth is that these books were added only about 500 years ago at the Council of Trent, and is basically why the Protestant Reformation of which we are a part developed. For 1500 years those books were considered good devotional literature, but not part of the Canon. The reformation was an attempt to stick with the original Bible.
Is anyone inspired today? This is a touchy subject and the Bible is thought to be the entire counsel of God as decided by men. There is certainly no biblical evidence that the Holy Spirit does not inspire people today, but we must always check it with the Bible to ensure that their words are completely in agreement with the Bible. God warns that in the end times there will many false prophets who will speak in the name of God but they may not be, especially if it goes against what is written in the Bible.
IV. The Living Word of God (John 1:1, 2 Timothy 3:16, Hebrews 4:12)
Though the Bible has many great principles for living in the world, it was not so much written about how to live in the world, but how to live in relationship with God. The reason we believe the Bible is the word of God is because it changes people. People including myself read the Bible for years without it having any impact on them, then suddenly the Holy Spirit makes it come alive and we are forever changed by the words we read as God starts to speak to us through His Word to mankind.
The Bible has a purpose to teach, correct, rebuke, and train in righteousness, therefore it is always alive in that it speaks to us throughout history. John is very clear in his writings that the Word (logos) is Jesus. This is kind confusing for us but basically what He means in terms of the Bible is that it is the message about Jesus (see 1 John 1:1-5). This is what I want all of us to get, and what I think a good preacher should show is that the Bible is a book about God’s redemptive work through Jesus Christ, and that this is what the whole Bible in both Testaments is talking about from start to finish. My prayer is that in my tenure here we will see the connections between all parts of the Bible and how it all leads to Christ, and that we can without a shadow of a doubt know that our faith is real. I think this is what Christians need in order to reach out to a lost world. We need to know beyond our beliefs that our faith is real, that everything in the Bible is true, and that there is no way we can keep it a secret any longer.
Next week we are going to begin a series beginning at the start of Genesis. This is a new start for me and this congregation, so what a better place to begin than the beginning. But more than that, we are going to see that even the first few chapters of the Old Testament most likely written by Moses about 3400 years ago, 1400 years before Jesus birth, point straight to Jesus and the work God is going to do through Him. Don’t worry we are not going to go verse by verse through the Bible from start to finish, but I believe we need to know the Old Testament to understand the New, and God has called me teach it all, not just our favorite parts. Believe it or not, the beginning of Genesis leads us beautifully to the Christmas story. But you will have to see for yourself.
What is the Bible? It is the most respected, published, verified piece of literature in the history of the world. We believe that it is the Word of God in which he speaks to us through men about him and his relationship to us, and what he did to enable us to have an eternal relationship with Him. Do we have to prove this? No, history speaks for itself and God has no need for us to prove anything to the world. What we do have to do is know what He says, live what he says to the best of our ability, and tell it to others.
I challenge all of us to get to know this book inside out, to read it from start to finish every year. This book is the closest thing we have to God in the flesh. Make it a part of you like your skin. Then see if there is anything else you can do but share it with others. That is why I am here, to help you do this, to help you understand the Bible, to teach us all how to use it for the purposes Timothy talked about. I am going to put it bluntly, if you don’t know the Bible, you don’t know God. Through prayer and reading you will know God. And God help me help you know Him to the fullest of our human capacity.
Let’s pray.
Father God, the Bible may be the greatest miracle you have ever done. To fully understand how this book came together so perfectly is mind-boggling. Yet many of us neglect it, using it as a prop or a symbol. We know you forgive for this, but Lord I pray that we here at Calvary, and Christians all over the world begin again to make the Bible, the cornerstone of our lives. That we would get to know you intimately as the Holy Spirit exposes you to us in your fullness through your word. May we be committed to receiving the full counsel of God, not just the parts we like or the parts that are easy. To know you, we must know your word which speaks to our hearts through the power of the Holy Spirit. Oh Lord thank you for giving us the Bible, it is all we need, your word, Jesus Christ himself, the sacred Scriptures. We want to know you through your son Jesus Christ, Amen.
