Artist: Azriel
Song: Word of God
Album: Systematic Theology Vol. 1

What is the Bible to you? Is it just a bunch of fictitious stories that are here to teach us a moral lesson or is it the Word of God to His creation? Does the Bible have contradictions, or can the seemingly contradictory statements be reconciled? Does it have errors, or is it a perfect document? Is it even reliable and can we trust what it says? Should we take the text literally or is it all figurative? We don't have any of the original copies, so how do we know things weren't changed? These are just a handful of questions that people tend to have about the Bible and its authenticity. Today, I want us to take a brief look at the Bible as both a historical document and as the Word of God so that we can understand, as Christians, why we should have a greater respect and love for this great document.

One of the first things that we must understand is that the Bible is the literal Word of God for His people. He had multiple authors pen these documents under divine inspiration so that they might be preserved for His creation to know His words (2 Timothy 3:16). That being said, the first thing we should probably look at is the historical authenticity of the Bible, which amazingly has tons of evidence; as a matter of fact, it is the most well preserved writing in antiquity. There have been thousands upon thousands of manuscripts found of the Bible and all of them are perfectly comparable to the other (minus a few spelling & grammatical differences). How reliable is that?! Take into consideration that manuscripts telling us of the life of Julius Caesar only number in the hundreds, but yet we have thousands of biblical manuscripts; it's simply astounding! And if you've read the Bible in any capacity, you'll notice that there are lots of different types of writing, which is one thing that really sets the Bible apart from any other ancient writing; the Bible contains history, genealogies, poetry, prophecy, epistles (letters) and so on, and they all interconnect with one another. That alone speaks mounds about the authenticity of the Bible.

How can we trust what the Bible says? That's a good question and one worth taking a good look at. First of all, we must say that nothing in the Bible, to this day, has been dis proven by anyone. One example of this would be the long running argument that the Davidic line never existed (in other words David & Solomon were just fairy tale), but recent archaeological excavations in Israel have found pieces that site the name of David. It's just small things like this that constantly prove that what the Bible says is true. You also then have other historical authors corroborating information and saying the same thing as the gospels, just like we have Josephus confirming the life of Jesus Christ and that He was crucified. In regard to New Testament texts (primarily the gospels), you have to take into consideration the fact that many of Jesus' followers were still living at the time these gospels were written and they would have easily dismantled any falsifications that were contained in the gospels. What about the disciples? After Jesus died they were hiding in a room afraid of what would come of them; if that's the case, then why after seeing Jesus would they all of a sudden boldly start proclaiming a gospel message. There's no way that any man would go to the grave over a lie such as this, especially so many of them because what would be the point? Stuff like that alone helps to clarify the validity of things.

As far as the contradictions go, they can all easily be reconciled with a firm understanding of the life and times of the writers and understanding what they're trying to say. One contradiction for example, tells of differing times when Jesus was on trial & crucified, but that is simply because Israel & Judah told time differently from one another, so one author was speaking of one time system and the other was using the other's system. What about the numerous translations we have today & the thought that they've been changed? There's really no argument here, as many of these translations (KJV, NKJV, ESV, NIV, etc) are all based off the original texts are are seemingly literal translations from the Greek & Hebrew manuscripts that are just updated in modern language.

Overall, we can hold a passage like 2 Timothy 3:16-17 to be very true for us. The Bible is God breathed and 100% inspired and it is profitable for everything that we would need in our Christian walk: doctrine, correction, reproof, teaching, and training. That alone should give us a newfound love for the Scriptures and make us want to dig deep into them everyday. Take a listen to today's song by Azriel and just fall in love with the Bible all over again. It's God's love letter to us, and if we have any love for Him, we should have a desire to read it from cover to cover. Amen!