Book Review title


Compelling Evidence for God and the Bible
by Douglas A. Jacoby, Harvest House Publishers, 2010, 260 pages,
$13.99, (paperback) ISBN-13: 978-0-7369-2708-6

Compelling Evidence for God and the BibleMany years ago while lecturing in London, England, I became a good friend of Douglas Jacoby. I was impressed with him, and encouraged him to use his enormous talent to be a power for God in apologetics. I am thrilled he has done that, and has far exceeded my feeble abilities in this area. In my opinion he is the strongest person in the church today in apologetics. Douglas has degrees in history from Duke University, theology from Harvard Divinity School, and ministry from Drew University. For several years he has lectured at universities in over 100 countries and debated people like Michael Shirmer, one of the educational community’s best known atheists.

This book is divided into four parts. The first part deals with atheism and the fundamental evidence for the existence of God. Jacoby does a wonderful job of`showing the intellectual impossibility of atheism. His discussion of the evidence for God’s existence is very well done, but somewhat superficial since his strength is not in science and his discussion is mostly philosophical and theological. Part two deals with the Bible and its credibility and canonicity. The third part looks at Jesus Christ and the evidence that He was who He said He was — the Son of God and the one path to God. Part four deals with world religions and personal decisions about God and how to handle doubt. There are three appendices on how to study the Bible, the Trinity, and apparent contradictions in the Bible. Douglas and I use many of the same tools — the cosmological flow sheet, “Flatland” and many quotes from atheists. The weakness of the book is that it tackles such a huge range of issues that some subjects may need more discussion. For example, Jacoby states that there is no direct scientific evidence for the existence of God (page 18), but that statement depends upon the meaning of the word “direct evidence.” He explains how we DO make evidence count however, and does it well.

The strength of this book is that the author is very well read and uses solid philosophical arguments in his defense of God’s existence. The book is not strong on science, but it is excellent in its intellectual handling of the objections of atheists to belief in God. It will be a great book to give to any student going to college, or to a college graduate who has lost faith while in college. We highly recommend this book.
 

Back to Contents Does God Exist?, NovDec10.