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EVIDENCE FOR GOD IN HIS WORD

Is the Holy Bible a man-made religious book? Or is it the only book ever written over many centuries by many writers sharing a common theme and message and whose writings are prophetically, historically, and scientifically consistently accurate and true? The biblical writers clearly state that “all scripture is God-breathed” (2 Timothy 3:16), and the writers “spoke from God by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20–21). The accuracy of the Bible has been proven true over many centuries of examination by skeptics and scholars.

Many areas in the biblical writings show God's inspiration. I would like to focus on three main areas that show God's authorship. The first one is history. Even though the Bible is not a history book, those historical references have always proven accurate whenever they mention dates, times, people, places, or events. Archaeology and historians have confirmed the Bible's historical facts.

Secondly, the Bible is not a science book, but God has revealed many details about the creation and how it works in the pages of the Bible. Sometimes it has taken scientists many centuries to understand and verify what God said in his Word about the world. For example, the Bible says that the Earth “hangs on nothing” (Job 26:7), which science now knows refers to our stability in space from the Sun's gravity. Likewise, the Bible describes ocean currents and boundaries (Proverbs 8:27–29) and how land masses were not divided early in Earth's history (Genesis 1:9). Only God could have known this when Old Testament writers wrote it! There are various other examples.

The third area which shows divine inspiration is the prophecies contained in the Bible. The Old Testament prophets of God accurately foretold future events regarding the nation of Israel and its leaders. The prophets foretold the means of death of some rulers and accurately predicted Israel's eventual downfall and captivity by the Babylonians, Persians, Medes, and Greeks (Daniel 8:20–22). The Old Testament also accurately predicted many events in the life of Christ and many details of his life and death centuries beforehand! The gospels in the New Testament often say, “this happened to fulfill the scriptures.” Only God could accurately predict future human events, sometimes centuries earlier, with no errors! The Bible proves itself to be God's Word.

— Cynthia Clayton

Picture credit:
© Julie Marcussen

Scripture links/references are from BibleGateway.com. Unhighlighted scriptures can be looked up at their website.