I remember talking a few years ago with a fellow undergraduate student. I was an intern in a local campus ministry and she had been attending our activities. We were talking about a topic about which she was passionate. I mentioned a couple of Scriptures which spoke directly to the topic. But then she said, “Oh, those verses are just the opinion of the man who wrote them,” and she dismissed them. Her comment led us to a deeper discussion about the Bible. Just what is the Bible? She seemed to view it as a collection of opinions that may have been true at one time for some people. I, on the other hand, viewed it as a word from God which was true for all people in all times.
There is a similar debate in Jer. 36. God tells Jeremiah to write some words down on a scroll—words God wants his people hear. Jeremiah dictates these words to his secretary Baruch who writes them on a scroll. The scroll literally becomes God’s word. But when the king finds out about the scroll, he has his servant Jehudi read it aloud. The king is in his winter quarters with a fire crackling. Whenever Jehudi read three or four columns on the scroll, the king would cut them off and toss them into the fire. To Jeremiah the document was the inspired word of God. To the king it was simply fuel for his fire.
Why should you trust the Bible? Is it just the collection of opinions of ancient authors? Or is it words from the one who made us? Why should you trust the Bible?
I’d like to approach this question in two ways. First, I want to answer the question from an analytical and objective viewpoint. There is objective evidence which would lead us to conclude that the Bible is an accurate account of ancient events and that there is something supernatural about it. Second, I want to answer the question from a philosophical and subjective viewpoint. There is something about the story of the Bible that connects so deeply with us that it must be more than human.
Let’s consider the analytical and objective evidence. I’ll ask and answer two common questions about the Bible. First, how do we know that the Bible we have today is what the original authors wrote? Consider the Old Testament. We do not possess any of the original scrolls on which Old Testament authors like Jeremiah wrote. What we possess are copies. This might alarm us since we know how easy it is to make a mistake when we try to copy down something. Yet those who copied the Old Testament did so very carefully. Here is one example. For many years, the oldest extensive copies of an Old Testament book came from the 10th century A. D. Then in 1947, a host of other Old Testament copies were found near the Dead Sea. These were roughly 1,000 years older than any previous copies. Scholars took a copy of Isaiah 53 from the 10th century A. D. and compared it to the Dead Sea Scroll copy which was 1,000 years older. They found only 17 letters which differed. 10 of those were mere differences in spelling. Of the 166 words in the chapter only 1 word was added, and it did not change the meaning of the text. Based on the Dead Sea Scrolls, scholars conclude that our Old Testament is over 95% accurate and reflects what the original authors wrote.[1]
There is similar evidence regarding the New Testament.[2] Like the Old Testament, we have no original documents from these authors, just copies. These copies, however, have two qualities. First, they are extremely old. For instance, we have a copy of part of John’s gospel which dates as early as A. D. 100. That’s only about 10 years after John wrote his original Gospel. We have very old copies.
And, we have a large number of copies. There are over 5,000 ancient copies of the New Testament in Greek, the language in which it was written. No other piece of ancient literature has that many ancient copies. For example, there are 500 different copies from before 500 A. D. For the Illiad, another ancient document, we have only 50 copies that date from 500 years or less after its origin. [3] These copies allow scholars to check for accuracy in copying. This had led them to conclude that 99.5% of what the New Testament writers originally wrote is what we have in our Bibles today. [4]
Here’s a second question regarding objective evidence about the Bible: What evidence supports the claim of these authors that what they wrote is from God? Let’s briefly explore three pieces of evidence. First, the Bible’s unity supports this claim.[5] The Bible consists of 66 books. They were written by about 40 different authors who came from a wide variety of backgrounds. They wrote over the time span of 1,600 years. They wrote from 3 different continents. And they wrote in 3 different languages. Imagine how difficult it would be today to undertake a 1,600 year writing project under the same circumstances. Imagine trying to gather 40 different educators, politicians, theologians, and scientists from different countries in different languages and asking them to write on a highly controversial topic without contradicting one another and with the result that their work is unified in its content. That’s what we have in the Bible. Only God could create a book of this magnitude and unity.
Second, the Bible’s predictive prophecy supports this claim. The Bible often predicted events well before they happened. Take, for instance, Is. 53. As I mentioned earlier, the Dead Sea copy of Is. 53 comes from about 100 years before Christ. The original book was written centuries before that. Is. 53 predicts that the Christ would be rejected and that his message would be met with disbelief. It says that he would suffer in silence. It predicts that he would die among the wicked and that be buried among the rich. All of these predictions came true in Christ. Hundreds of years before Jesus arrived Is. 53 predicted what would happen. Prophecies like these demand explanation. They provide evidence that this book truly is a word from God.
Third, Jesus’ endorsement of the Bible supports its claim to be the Word of God. Concerning the Old Testament, Jesus often quoted from it authoritatively and upheld its status as God’s Word. For example, to validate his teaching on marriage and divorce in Matt. 19:4-9, Jesus quoted from the book of Genesis. Jesus believed the Old Testament to be God’s Word. Concerning the New Testament, Jesus promised its future writers that they would be guided by the Holy Spirit. In Matt. 10:19-20 and Jn. 14:26 Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would speak through them, would teach them, and would remind them of everything Jesus had told them. Thus, if Jesus is the Son of God, his endorsement of the Old Testament books and New Testament authors directly supports the Bible’s claim to be God’s Word.
That is some of the objective evidence which should lead us to trust the Bible. I’d like to focus now on some subjective evidence. In his study of religions called Dissonant Voices, Harold Netland writes that whatever religion you choose, it must be able to make sense of certain things.[6] For instance, he says, it must be capable of cultivating a sense of moral values. It must be able to provide the inner resources people need for coping with crisis. It must offer a prophetic voice against injustice. And it must effectively answer questions such as Who is God? Why is there suffering in the world? Why do we exist? What is the nature of salvation? We can stretch Netland’s argument to cover religious literature. If a supposed sacred literature cannot provide these things, it cannot be from God.
I’d like to focus on his last proposal: any document claiming to be from God ought to be able to effectively answer questions about life. In other words, it will make sense of life. English scholar N. T. Wright has written a book about this very thing. Called Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense the book explores how the Bible makes sense of four fundamental issues in life. [7] I’d like to summarize what the heart of Wright’s proposal.
As humans, one of the things we long for is justice. When children, we are quick to point out “That’s not fair!” Our bloated legal system is evidence of our obsession with justice. And those events which wound us deeply often touch on justice: an innocent person gets convicted; the guilty are let off; victims don’t get compensated; countries invade other countries. Nazi Germany. Rwanda. South Africa. American slavery. Human history is littered with examples of injustice and our longing for them to be made right. Wright puts it this way: “But all people know, in cooler moments, that this strange thing we call justice, this longing for things to be put right, remains one of the great human goals and dreams.”[8]
A second fundamental longing is the longing for spirituality. Though the skepticism taught in the academy has attempted to subdue this longing, the longing cannot be contained. Spirituality has erupted in Western culture like hidden springs, expressing itself in New Age mysticism, tarot cards, crystals, horoscopes, fundamentalism, and militant Christians and Muslims. These springs have bubbled even more vigorously in Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East. Wright puts it this way:“…the widespread hunger for spirituality, which has been reported in various ways across the whole of human experience, is a genuine signpost to something which remains just around the corner, out of sight.” [9] In other words, it begs for explanation. Why are we humans so thirsty for the spiritual?
Third, we humans long for community. We act as if we were made to be social creatures. We find meaning by seeing ourselves as part of a family, a neighborhood, a workplace, a town, or a nation. Yet we struggle with these relationships. From the most intimate—marriage—to those on a large scale—our civic relationships as a nation—we never quite achieve the community we desire.
Fourth, we humans long for beauty. Beauty, whether in something we see in nature or something that’s been created by humans, often evokes our deepest feelings of awe, gratitude, and reverence. And yet beauty slips through our fingers. We photograph the sunset but the image doesn’t match the moment itself. Our own physical beauty fades over time.
How do we explain these longings? Wright suggests that the Bible is the one story that best makes sense of them. Scripture is not a rule book. Scripture is not a moral guide. It is, above all, the true story about God and us. It offers the best explanation of our search for justice, our quest for spirituality, our longing for relationships, and our yearning for beauty. Here’s how:
In its opening chapters, Scripture speaks of a God who created the world and all that is in it and proclaimed it beautiful. He formed humans in his own image and intended for them to experience community with one another and spirituality with Him.
But the story went awry in the first few chapters of the Bible. Rebellion in Eden led to the first murder, to widespread violence, and to the absurd idea of building a tower to heaven. In eleven chapters the world was given over to injustice, spurious types of spirituality (like trying to stretch to heaven by human efforts), failed relationships, and the creation of buildings which spoke of human pride rather than natural beauty.
But in chapter 12, God launched a rescue operation through a man named Abraham. It was God’s intent to bless all peoples on earth through Abraham and his descendents. God held out a vision of a world of justice, where God and people would live in harmony, where relationships would thrive, and where beauty would triumph over ugliness.
The rest of the Old Testament focused on that vision expressed through kings, a temple, the law, and new creation:
Kings were placed over Abraham’s descendents, Israel, to help fulfill this vision. Most failed. Yet the prophets held out hope that one day there might be a new sort of king who would set everything right.
A temple was built as an object of beauty and as a space where heaven and earth met so that humans could rightly pursue spirituality. The priests and the kings, however, failed to care for the temple. Its beauty faded. Its religion ritualized. Yet the people held out hope for the reestablishment of a place where heaven and earth would meet, where our need for access to God could truly be answered.
A law was written to help people learn to live together, with God and with each other. Yet the people broke the law, and their community, spirituality, and justice was marred.
Still, hope was held out for a new creation, a time in which God would establish worldwide peace, reestablish the beauty of Eden, and harmony between creation, God, and humanity.
All of these hopes were fulfilled through Jesus. The New Testament is not about a new moral teaching, or Jesus’ moral example, or how Jesus created a new way to get to heaven. It is instead the story of Jesus inaugurating a new world of justice, spirituality, relationships, and beauty. He fulfills the hopes wrapped up in kings, temples, law, and new creation. He himself would become the place where heaven and earth meet. He would not simply rescue humanity from its own failings but from evil itself. In his crucifixion he would take that evil upon himself. In his resurrection, he would begin a new world. Wright puts it this way: “When Jesus emerged from the tomb, justice, spirituality, relationship, and beauty rose with him.” [10]
Jesus then gave his followers the Holy Spirit as a foretaste of the future when all creation will be fully rescued from the corruption which defaces its beauty, destroys its relationships, removes the sense of God’s presence, and makes it a place of injustice and violence. The Spirit was also given as a resource so that Jesus’ followers might work toward that future. The church, empowered by that Spirit, advances beauty, justice, spirituality, and community.
And the Bible itself has been given to fashion and form Jesus’ followers to carry out this work. Wright puts it this way: “[The Bible] is there to enable people to work for justice, to sustain their spirituality as they do so, to create and enhance relationships at every level, and to produce that new creation which will have about it something of the beauty of God himself.” [11]
There is no other document which explains the human longing for beauty, community, justice, and spirituality. Such a document could only come from God.
[11] Wright, 182-183.
