HOW I KNOW THE BIBLE IS THE WORD OF GOD, PART II
“Questions People Ask”
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Miracles of origination/preservation/circulation…….external evidence
Now the internal evidence………..
1. Scientific Accuracy
The Bible revealed scientific facts hundreds and thousands of years before science learned about them.
While it is true that the Bible is not primarily a science book, not a text book designed to speak to your mind, but rather a love letter to speak to your heart, we should remember that the God of salvation is the God of creation…and when the Bible does speak on scientific matters, it speaks with complete authority and absolute certainty and accuracy.
Every once in a while you’ll hear about modern science disagreeing with the Bible. What should we do when this happens? Be patient, and give science time to catch up! Science has always needed to catch up w/ the Bible. Some examples:
Medicine:
As recently as 1600 doctors and scientists still believed that many ailments and diseases were a result of the human body having too much blood.
Barber shop/pole out front/red and white stripe/it’s not a candy-cane!/the red stripe signified that you could go there to be “bled”. Doctors would prescribe that you go to the barber to be bled! (I’ve been to some barbers recently who must have the same opinion)
When George Washington became ill, his doctors bled him 3 times, the 3rd time they removed almost a quart of blood, and he died! (by the way, just to get even, politicians today have been bleeding us to death!) But now, science knows, it’s the blood that fights diseases/brings nourishment/repairs tissue/promotes growth. If only they had read Lev. 17:11, “the life of the flesh is in the blood.”
14th C./black plague/decimated the population in Europe, as 1 in 4 people died! (count 1, 2, 3, dead!)
It wasn’t the scientists/doctors who brought the plague under control, it was the church. The church applied a principle to the situation that was unheard of in that day, but which we take for granted today…quarantine! Lev. 13:46
46All the days wherein the plague shall be in him he shall be defiled; he is unclean: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.
People in Moses’ day didn’t know anything about microbiology. They didn’t know what a germ was!/virus was! But God gave them the principle of quarantine.
1800’s/physician in Vienna named Semovice, in charge of a hospital there/pregnant women were coming in for routine exams/immediately after exams, many of them were dying of infection. Semovice noticed that doctors were entering the OB area from all other areas of the hospital, including the morgue, w/out washing their hands/he made it a rule/the doctors had a fit!/ “this is ridiculous, it will slow us down!”
The medical field today knows to wash up, but only because science has caught up w/ the Bible in this area.
Thousands of years ago, Moses said in Numbers 19
14This is the law, when a man dieth in a tent: all that come into the tent, and all that is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days. 15And every open vessel, which hath no covering bound upon it, is unclean. 16And whosoever toucheth one that is slain with a sword in the open fields, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days. … 18And a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it in the water, and sprinkle it upon the tent, and upon all the vessels, and upon the persons that were there, and upon him that touched a bone, or one slain, or one dead, or a grave: 19And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on the third day, and on the seventh day: and on the seventh day he shall purify himself, and wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at even.
Principles here: quarantine/washing w/ water/changing clothes/time interval for bacteria to die
Mold or bacteria in home? Lev. 14:33-57 (Stan Kupish)
How did Moses know these things? “All scripture is given by inspiration of God.”
So far we’ve been looking at the medical field, and all the verses we’ve looked at so far are from the pentateuch, the first 5 books of the Bible, written down by Moses. Where was Moses from? Egypt!
Egypt was the leader in the medical trade in those days. The ancient Egyptians were considered to be brilliant in the area of medicine. Archaeologists found a medical book in 1855, “Papyrus Eburs”: a comprehensive book containing virtually all the medical info they had in the time in which Moses lived. Some of the info it contained were simply outlandish.
“to prevent the hair from turning gray, you anoint your head w/ blood of a black cat boiled in oil, or with the fat of a rattlesnake”
baldness: “apply a mixture of 6 fats, namely those of the snake, to strengthen it, anoint with the tooth of a donkey, crushed in honey.”
Another cure: (soak head in persimmon juice/won’t grow hair, but will shrink your head to fit the hair you’ve got!)
Other remedies include donkey’s dung/lizard’s blood/swines teeth/rotten meat/moisture from pig’s ears/fly excretion (hard to collect!)
This is from the brilliant ancient egyptians, in whose schools Moses was educated. I’m glad in Moses’ writings we don’t find these instructions! I’m glad that when you read the dietary code/sanitary code Moses wrote down, you find the highest standards anywhere, and w/out medical contradiction…why? Because all scripture is given by inspiration!
Astronomy:
We take for granted that the earth is suspended in space, hanging from nothing.
Ancient egyptians believed and taught that the earth was supported by 5 marble pillars.
Greeks believed earth rested on the shoulders of the god Atlas.
Hindus believed earth rested on the backs of elephants, when they shook, that was an earthquake…and the elephants rested on the back of a huge tortoise, which was on top of a coiled serpent in the midst of a cosmic sea.
Aren’t you glad you don’t read that foolishness in the Bible!
Job said in the oldest of Biblical writings:
Job 26
7He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
That was a radical thought until just a few hundred years ago. How did Job know that perhaps 8k years ago? All scripture is given by inspiration!
Nobody believed the earth was round until 1492. “columbus, you’re gonna sail off the end of the earth…but 700 years before Christ, Isaiah said that God “sitteth upon the circle of the earth.” Circle in heb. Means globe or sphere.
150 B.C., Astronomer named Hipparchus laid down his pencil and smiled, “it’s done”! He believed he had counted all the stars in the sky. 1,022! That was the number used in Universities for 250 years. Then Ptolemy came along and laughed, 1,022, that’s ridiculous, there’s 1,026! He found 4 more! And that was science for 1,300 years. Then Galileo came along with his invention, the first crude telescope, he looked thru it for the first time, and gasped. We know now that there are billions and billions of stars in each of the galaxies, which are innumerable!
What did the Bible say long before any of them were even born?
Jer. 33
22As the host of heaven cannot be numbered
God said to Abraham, your seed will be innumerable, (then used an illustration) like the stars of heaven.
Science has always needed to catch up w/ the Bible.
Science is not the only witness we call to the stand tonite, also the witness of history:
Historical Accuracy:
Not a history book, but it is “His Story”. And historians have always needed to catch up with the Bible.
The Bible records the fact that Moses wrote the first 5 books of the Bible, and Jesus verified that in the NT. For many years, unbelieving historians laughed at the thought that Moses wrote the Pentateuch. ‘that’s impossible’, they said, for there was no written language when Moses lived!
Archaeologists continued their work, and in 1887 in N. Egypt 300 clay tablets were unearthed, we know them as the “tel-el-armana” tablets. What were they? Letters and business transactions between Egypt and palestine, dated centuries before Moses was even born. And now it has been proven not only did they have a written language, they had a postal service! (it might have been quicker than the one we’ve got today!)
Remember the story in the book of Daniel of Belshazzar seeing the handwriting on the wall? For centuries histories mocked that story as mythology, stating that they have the Babylonian records, which show that the last king of Babylon was NOT Belshazzar, but was Nabonitis. As a matter of fact, they say, we have no record anywhere that any Belshazzar ever lived!
One day a clay tablet was found by archaeologists which revealed the truth: Nabonitis was the father of Belshazzar, and they were co-regents, ruling together! Nabonitis traveled the world, his son ruled the kingdom. Now we have a better understanding of Daniel 5:16
16And I have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and dissolve doubts: now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to me the interpretation thereof, thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about thy neck, and shalt be the third ruler in the kingdom.
What if that tablet had never been found? Should we doubt the Bible, no! But isn’t it terrific how God makes His truth known, often times w/ an exclamation point tacked onto the end!
Late 1800’s/early 1900’s Sir William Ramsey was a well-known archaeologist and historian. He was professor of humanities at Aberdeen University. He was considered to be the world’s most imminent scholar on Asia-Minor, and it’s geography and history. He read the book of Acts and said,
“the book of Acts is a highly imaginitive and carefully colored account of primitive Christianity” (in essence, “of my knowledge of history, I have no respect for Luke as a historian”)
Then he went to the middle east for the express purpose of proving the Bible wrong in its history. He came home and wrote the book, “Luke, the beloved physician” in which he proclaimed Dr. Luke to be one of the worlds foremost historians.
Here’s a quote from Sir William Ramsey…this was after looking carefully at the evidence:
“I take the view that Luke’s history is unsurpassed in its trustworthiness. You may press the words of Luke in a degree beyond any other historian, and they will stand the keenest scrutiny, and the harshest treatment.”
History is still catching up with the Bible/Science, too
Scientific Accuracy…Historical Accuracy
Finally, consider the 3rd category:
Prophetic Accuracy (book: A Ready Defense)
No book in history has dared to predict the future to the degree the Bible has, without being proven wrong.
For the sake of time, let’s narrow it down to just the prophecies that dealt w/ the coming of Christ, 2000 years ago.
Over 300 direct prophecies in question, like,
Is. 7:14 He would be born of a virgin Lk. 1:7 it happened!
Micah 5:2 born in Bethlehem Lk. 2:4 that happened!
Gen. 49:10 born of tribe of Judah Mt. 3:3 that happened!
Psalm 78:2 speak in parables Mt. 13:34 that happened!
Zech. 9:9 ride on colt of a donkey Mt. 21 that happened!
Is. 61 heal broken-hearted Lk. 4:18 that happened!
Is. 53:3 rejected by own Jn. 1:11 that happened!
Is. 53:7 stand silent before accusers Mk. 15:5 that happened!
Ps. 22:18 cast lots for His robe Jn. 19:23 that happened!
Ps. 22 (hundreds of years before crucifixion ever invented or thought of) prophets said they would pierce His hands and feet, and it happened!
Ps. 22:1 “my God, why forsaken me?” Mt. 27:46 that happened!
v. 5 tongue cleave to jaw Mt. 26:15 that happened!
Zech. 11:2 sold by enemies for 30 silver Mt. 26:15 that happened!
Is. 53:9 buried w/ rich Mt. 27 that happened!
One skeptic said, “certainly this is the most striking coincidence of details.”
Dr. Charles Ryrie points out that, by the law of chance, it would require 2 hundred billion earths, each populated w/ four billion people, to come up w/ one person who could achieve one hundred accurate prophecies w/out any errors in sequence. But, in Christ’s coming alone, there were not one hundred, but over 300 prophecies fulfilled! And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, the prophecies dealing w/ His first coming!
Ill.—cover the state of texas w/ quarters, 2 feet deep, mark the back of 1 of them with an X. Fly a man in and drop him anywhere you want in the state, blindfold him, and ask him to find that quarter with the X first try! That’s the same chance of just 8 of the Bible’s prophecies being fulfilled by coincidence!
It’s more than just a coincidence, it’s evidence that demands a verdict! The problem, Mr. skeptic, Mr. infidel, is, you love your sin, and if the Bible is true, you are condemned!
The Bible:
It’s salvation to the sinner/sanctification to the saint/sufficient to the suffering/satisfying to the scholar
It’s so deep the scholar can swim in it for a lifetime w/out ever touching bottom, yet so simple, a child can approach it for a drink, w/out fear of drowning!
I love it’s depth, but the greatest truth I’ve ever learned is this:
Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so!
