Skeptics come up to me all the time and ask me to prove God’s existence, or they deny any claim I make about God because I have to first prove God to them. When I cite the Bible, they then say I have to prove the Bible too. Take careful note that NO AUTHORITY that supports the Bible in any way is ever going to satisfy them. I love the way Voddie Baucham puts it. If someone challenges you to a sword fight and then says, “I don’t believe in your sword,” you do not need to set your sword down and fight without it. You also do not need to set it down and give them a lesson on what happens with metallurgy and sharp metal on flesh. Hit them anyway and ask, “Do you believe in it now?”
This week, Worldview Warriors is answering the question: “What does the Bible say about God?” I want to make this absolutely clear: The Bible never tries to prove God’s existence. It assumes it from the get go. “In the beginning, God…” As John MacArthur said once, “If you can’t get past the first four words, you won’t accept the rest of it.” But the question remains: How can I trust a book about God’s interactions with man unless it proves God even exists in the first place? Why should I believe it?
I want to make something else absolutely clear. The Bible does not need evidence for the claim that God exists. The Bible IS evidence that God exists. It’s not the only evidence, but it is the best evidence and that is why so many skeptics try to do everything they can to discredit it. It’s the same reason the court lawyers do whatever they can to discredit the testimony of an eyewitness that could make or break the case. The Bible is the record of the greatest epic story of all time and unlike the fables of Gilgamesh, Lord of the Rings, the Iliad, or any others, this epic is actual history.
If God did not exist, neither would the Bible. For a book written by 40 authors from all kinds of walks of life, in all different genres, in very different political, social, and physical settings, in three languages, on three continents, over a 1600-year time frame and still all say the exact same central message, unless God had his direct hand on this book, it would never be that cohesive and coherent. The message itself is something absolutely no one would write unless it was God-inspired. If the Bible were made up, the accounts do not make any sense about why they are the way they are. Israel used to be enslaved, Gideon shrinking his army from 32,000 to 300, Jesus being born as a baby with no hoopla other than from angelic hosts before shepherds, a man being crucified as the central point of the message, and death to self with salvation by grace through faith are things that absolutely do not make sense to the natural world. That is why Paul described it to the Jews as a stumbling block and to the Greeks as foolishness.
The Bible does not try to prove God’s existence, however, the Bible records many accounts where God proves himself. If I were to try to make a claim about a man of praying bringing fire from heaven three separate times, the claim is not 1 Kings 18 (the Mt. Carmel showdown) and 2 Kings 1 (two separate military companies trying to arrest Elijah), the Bible is not the claim I would make. The claim is Elijah called fire from heaven. The evidence is the Biblical accounts of 1 Kings 18 and 2 Kings 1.
Paul made a claim about the resurrected Jesus. He cited 500 witnesses, many of whom were still around when Paul wrote that. I had one skeptic say, “The account that makes the claim is also the account that claims the witnesses so it doesn’t count.” Such an argument is utter gibberish. If you are in a courtroom and the witness makes a claim saying “Not only was I at x place at y time, but I have many people who saw me there, including some who don’t like me,” then the court is going to have to take that into account. However this skeptic is saying, “The witness is not trustworthy, therefore his claim to have alibies is not trustworthy too.” It’s hogwash. Eyewitness testimony is still one of the strongest forms of evidence in a courtroom and in any investigation. That is why so much time is spent determining if a witness is reliable or not.
The Bible records many public displays of God’s interactions with men. The showdown on Mt. Carmel in 1 Kings 18 was witnessed my many people. Many of the accounts of the Bible were public events. Even Noah’s Flood - it was witnessed by all 8 people who survived it. The accounts of the Bible are not the claims of the accounts. They are the records of the accounts. It is no different than a video recording of last year’s Super Bowl is evidence of the Super Bowl. The video is not the claim, it is the evidence. Likewise, the Bible is not the claim about God. It is the evidence of God.
But, the Bible is 2000 years old. How can we trust something that ancient? How old a document is has nothing to do with the trustworthiness of it. Especially when these same skeptics who mention this have absolutely no issues with the reliability of any other ancient historical document such as the Gaelic Wars of Julius Caesar, or the writings of Homer, Sophocles, or Aristotle, or Hammurabi’s Code, or anything else of ancient history. Just the Bible. Yet, when it comes to a historical analysis of such documents, the Bible’s reliability surpasses that of any other document by far. Why is the Bible singled out with a double standard? The answer is simple: because it is the evidence that the God of which it describes is real and the God of the Bible is the same one who will hold each person accountable for every thought, action, and motive and that is what they will not tolerate, to their own foolishness and demise.
The Bible says so much about God. On Monday, Katie Erickson gave a short description about the references to him and what it says about him. All we know about God is what he revealed to us. Man could not figure out God if he tried. The finite cannot comprehend the infinite, however the infinite can come down to the level of the finite. Man can’t find God, but God can find man, and the only way man will come to God is if the Father draws him and he acts in response to that drawing. God is under no obligation to give many persons additional proof of his existence than what he already has, but those who receive the truth that he exists and seeks to find out more will receive more truth and if he continues, he will find God. God is a diligent rewarder of those who seek him diligently and to do so they must first believe that he is (Hebrews 11:6). God has revealed himself in and through Scripture and ultimately through Christ his Son (Hebrews 1:1-2). God leaves it up to us to believe him or not, and that decision does nothing but help determine what our destination is. It does nothing to change the fact of his existence. As we enter 2018, know that God is real and he left a treasure map to find him in the 66 books of the Bible. Will you search it to find him?
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