How do we see Jesus?
If you’re anything like me, one way you see Jesus, or one way you’ve seen Jesus, is through His word. In scripture. The Bible.
I know this isn’t true for everyone, but from an early age, I was raised in a family and in a church where the Bible was held up as the inspired word of God. I was taught from an early age that everything the Bible says is true.
That I can trust what has been written in these pages and that I can build my life on these words.
Maybe you grew up in a similar way. Where, at least when you were a kid, no one ever questioned the Bible. We were taught that scripture is “God-breathed.”
We got that from scripture! 2 Timothy 3.6-17 says,
“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
And of course, at first, that made sense. That was enough for me personally. Maybe it was for you too.
But then, that verse and that logic became a little problematic.
For one, it didn’t make sense to me that we could use a verse from scripture to prove that the rest of scripture was true. How does a verse in 2 Timothy prove that the rest of the New Testament is true? Or that Isaiah is true?
It’s not like there was a day when God handed the Bible to us out of Heaven and said, “This is my inspired word.” No. Scripture is a collection of writings from over 40 different authors in three different languages, Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic, written over at least a 1000 year period. Some say more.
And on top of that, 2 Timothy itself is a book we ascribe to a man named Paul, but very few scholars believe that Paul actually wrote 2 Timothy. I love 2 Timothy. I believe 2 Timothy is the inspired word of God. But I would have a hard time talking to my friend at Starbucks who doesn’t believe in Jesus and has questions about the reliability of scripture explaining that this verse from the Bible in a book of questionable authorship is the sole reason I believe the Bible is true!
For some of you, this is a big issue for you. It’s one of the reasons you’ve had a hard time believing in Jesus.
How can you be sure the Bible is true?
How can we know that what we read today in the Bible is what they wrote back then?
After all, we don’t have even ONE original text! All we have are copies of copies.
What that means is this… all we have are manuscripts that were copied by scribes. Those manuscripts were copied by other scribes. Those manuscripts were copied by other scribes. This went on and on throughout history. We’ve taken a compilation of those copies and put together these pages that we call the Bible.
So how can we trust that what we have is what they wrote?
Ever play the Telephone Game? Imagine lining up 10 people and whispering a sentence to the first person in line. They take what they heard and whisper into the ear of the next person. That happens all the way down the line. What are the chances that the last person in line can write down exactly what the first person in line heard?
Pretty slim! Believe me! I tried it on stage one Sunday and it was an epic fail!
If we can’t even pass a simple phrase down the line with 10 people, how can we trust that these scribes over the centuries copied the Biblical text correctly?
It would be different if they had the printing press. That wasn’t invented until 1440! That’s 1400 years after some of these documents were originally composed. That means that every copy we have, and every copy of every copy we have, is a handwritten copy.
How many mistakes were made? How many copies were based on those mistakes? And how many mistakes were made after those mistakes?
How can we trust that what we have is what they wrote?
The Bible Tells Me So
This is hugely important because the scripture we hold on to, the Bible we believe in, tells a story that points to a person that we believe is the One and only Son of God. Jesus.
We believe in Jesus, some of us from an early age, and we believe that “Yes, Jesus loves me…” Why? Because… “the Bible tells me so.”
Today, I’m not going to be able to answer all your questions about the Bible, but I do want to give you 5 reasons why I trust the Bible. 5 Reasons why I believe you can see Jesus in scripture.
5 REASONS Why I Trust the Bible.
1 // The Places + People
The Bible speaks of historical places and people. And we have EVIDENCE that those places and people are real.
You can get on a plane this week and travel to Israel and see for yourself, just like Alisha and I did back in October, and what you’ll find is that everything you read in your scripture can be tied to the same physical PLACE where the Bible says it happened.
[slideshowck id=3301]You can sail on the Sea of Galilee. You can walk on it if you have enough faith. I tried, I didn’t! 🙂
You can go to Capernaum, the hometown of Jesus. You can sit in the synagogue where He once taught.
You can travel to Bethlehem and see where He was born. You can go to the Shepherd’s field and see where the angels announced his birth.
You can go to Jerusalem and see where the Temple once stood.
You can go to the Garden of Gethsemane and pray on the Mount of Olives.
You can see the probable locations where Jesus died, where He was buried and where He rose again.
Most of the time, if you’re not standing where something happened you’re at least within 100 yards of where it actually happened!
These places are all real. You can go and see where everything happened.
And you can see EVIDENCE that the PEOPLE we read about in the Bible lived.
You can see the buildings and the arena that King Herod built. You can see Pilate’s Stone that was discovered in 1961 in Caesarea proving that Pilate was a real person.
You can go and see for yourself where everything happened that scripture says happened. There’s evidence all around and what’s amazing is that they are still making discoveries.
[Tweet “Each new discovery confirms the Biblical story again.”]What’s more amazing is that each discovery confirms the Biblical story again. Every time they dig and every time they find something, it confirms what we already believe is true. They’ve yet to find anything to disprove Christianity!
Can You Trust?
Can you trust that what you read is what they wrote? I believe you can because there is physical evidence that proves our faith isn’t built on fairy tails. The places and the people the Bible speaks of are real.
But there’s more. For the next reason I believe you can trust the Bible, check the NEXT POST! (coming soon)
