Essentials Of The Faith / Adult Sunday School Class / Out Of The Box
Whose Line Is it Anyway?
Essentials Of The Faith / Adult Sunday School Class / Out Of The Box
Whose Line Is it Anyway?
Myth: The Bible was written by men – long after the events recorded actually occurred
How many of you have heard this myth?
What does the critic say about the accuracy of the Old Testament?
From BibleStudy.org:
Skeptics have pointed out that the oldest extant version of the Old Testament is less than 1,500 years old. The skeptic looks at the manuscript and says, "The first books of the Bible were written hundreds and hundreds of years before this copy."
He says, "All we have available to us is a copy of a copy of a copy, etc. After centuries and centuries of transcribing copies of copies of copies, there must be HUNDREDS of errors in the text of the Old Testament!"
Telephone tag: front to back:
Spread the word.
Spread this message: “Jonathan went to pre-K at Luther Memorial. He learned about the letter “K” and told his best friend Ben and another classmate, Kyle, that he could spell his last name: K-U-N-K-E-L. Later Susan took Jon and Josh to Wal-Mart to pick up some T-shirts because the weather is getting warmer.
The Message
The claim sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?
What do some say about the accuracy of the Gospels?
Ok, they had the written word but how could anyone remember all of the details from a hundred years back?
Tell about running playful argument Susan and I have about how she came back in my life.
The claim sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?
How then, could the Bible be accurate?
Reality: The Bible is the inspired, accurate Word of God
2 Timothy 3:16-17
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
What do we mean when say the Bible is inspired by God?
God speaks to – sometimes audibly, or to the heart of the author.
The style of the author is preserved.
While the Bible does not explicitly state that the book in its entirety is inspired by God, passages throughout the Bible give testimony of the author’s inspiration.
The Christian Apologetics Research Ministry does a
great job summarizing the testimony the Bible gives to its inspiration by
God.
. 2 Sam. 23:2, "The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and His word was on my tongue."
Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 14:37
If anybody thinks he is a prophet or spiritually gifted, let him acknowledge that what I am writing to you is the Lord's command.
Peter equated Paul’s letters with scripture when he wrote in 2 Peter 3:16
16 He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Jesus said about His own teachings in John 14:26
But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.
Who has heard of comedian Steven Wright?
Described ridiculous stories with a dead pan delivery.
I lost power in my house last night and wanted to make myself a sandwich. I had to use the flash my camera to see what I was doing and took 25 pictures of my sandwich … the neighbors called to tell me there was lightening in the kitchen.
He also once said, “The brain is the most important in the body … but look at which organ is saying that …”
How do you know the authors of the Bible are telling the truth when they claim inspiration by God?
Christian apologists will tell you that has so many authors written over the period of thousands years with remarkable consistency must indeed be accurate.
Establishing the inspiration of the Bible should be enough to establish the accuracy of the Old and New Testaments but lets address some of the questions we raised earlier.
The Old Testament we have was put together with manuscripts written long after the original copy was penned.
Preservation of the scriptures was very important from the time their words were first written.
From Biblestudy.org
It is important to understand that the copying methods used in reproducing the Bible were computer-like in their accuracy. Notice the beginning of the history of biblical preservation:
"And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, "Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee" (Deuteronomy 31:24-26).
Scribe Slide
Here we see the beginning of the sacred trust given to the Levites to safeguard the Scriptures. The "writings of words" referred to here are the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, also known as the Law or Pentateuch (Greek) or Torah (Hebrew).
From that time forward, the religious leaders of Israel became the zealous guardians of the Scriptures. Later, after the Babylonian captivity of Judah, these Scriptures were practically worshipped as much as was the Creator Himself. It could be said that the love that the Jews had for the Law was tantamount to idolatry! They watched over these Sacred Writings more carefully than any other possession in the Holy Land.
Joshua, Moses' successor, also instructed the Israelites to have a special concern for "all the words of the Law" (Joshua 8:35)
There was not a word of all that Moses had commanded that Joshua did not read to the whole assembly of Israel, including the women and children, and the aliens who lived among them.
. He told the people to sit down as the Law was read to them. This reading probably took several days because the Torah was a lengthy volume.
Many people assume that Paul wrote more of the Bible than any other servant of God. Actually, Paul wrote more books than anyone else, but Moses wrote more volume. Each of Moses' five books was much longer than any of Paul's smaller books. All in all, Moses wrote about three times as much material as Paul.
In the time of Joshua, the entirety of the Torah was read to the children of Israel. A great reverence for the Scripture had developed within one generation after the Exodus.
We also see that, the Levites were not the only ones involved in preserving the Scriptures. God knew that the day would come when His people would reject Him as their king and that they would insist on having a human king (Deuteronomy 17:14-15).
But notice what God instructed the new king to do:
"And it shall be, when he sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites: And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them" (verses 18-19).
The kings of Israel not only had to study and obey the Law, they also had to write their own personal copies of that Law!
The Rules of Copying
Now, the result of this reverence was the creation of a system of copying which is nothing less than astounding. The Levites had to create a system of making new copies of the Bible as old copies wore out and had to be destroyed. They knew it would be easy to make a mistake in copying a new transcript, so here is what they did. They developed elaborate and meticulous RULES for transcribing.
They decreed that when a person was making a new text, he had to copy the original page with such exactness that the number of words on a page could not be changed. If the original page had 288 words, then the page being copied had to have the same 288 words.
Each line on a new page had to be the exact same as the line on the old page. If the first line on the original page had nine words, the first line on the copy page had to have nine words.
After a page was copied, the number of letters on that page was counted and compared with the original.
After a page was copied, each letter was counted and compared with the original. After a page was copied, someone would check to see what the middle letter was on the copy and the original.
As for the Gospels, they really weren’t written that long after the fact …
Matthew – written in the 60’s
Mark – written in the 50’s
Luke – 60 – recorded with diligence
Luke 1:1-4
1Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled[a] among us, 2just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4so that you may know the certainty [exact truth – NASB] of the things you have been taught.
John: written between 85 – 90
Considering that Christ’s ministry began at around age 30, it is conceivable that many people who witnessed the ministry of Christ were still alive when these Gospels were written. And to the best of my knowledge, none of these people ever challenged the accuracy of these scriptures!
And indeed Peter declared in Acts 2:22-24 (Acts written in 61)
22"Men of Israel, listen to these words: (W)Jesus the Nazarene, (X)a man attested to you by God with miracles and (Y)wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know--
23this Man, delivered over by the (Z)predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, (AA)you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.
24"But (AB)God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it (AC)was impossible for Him to be held in its power.
Can we be certain that the New Testament is reliable?
Among the copies of New Testament manuscripts available there are variations in spelling, however, Dr. Bruce Metzger of Princeton Theological Seminary, the variants do not put any Biblical doctrine in jeopardy.
In fact, according to Biblical scholars Norman Geisler and William Nix, the New Testament has a 99.5% purity rate in terms of accuracy -- a better accuracy rate than any other well-known book
Archaeologists love to look to ancient works for a picture of the society they are studying. The accuracy of a work can be determined by the number of manuscripts available.
Why is the number of manuscripts a good measurement for the accuracy of a work?
The manuscripts can be compared with each other.
Let’s see how the New Testament stacks up against other works of antiquity for accuracy by the number of manuscripts available.
The Roman historian Tacitus wrote the Annals of Imperial Rome . There is only one manuscript of his first six books and another manuscript for books eleven to sixteen (the other books are lost) .
Josephus's work, The Jewish War has 9 Greek manuscripts, a Latin translation, and other Russian translations
The runner-up to the New Testament in terms of manuscript
amount is Homer's Iliad . There are less than 650 Greek manuscripts
How many New Testament manuscripts do you think exist?
Over 20,000 New Testament manuscripts exist .
Bible Accuracy – What About The Translations?
One question I often get is why aren’t all the translations consistent?
Indeed some translations are just not accurate especially when agendas such as political are involved. I personally use NIV and NASB but there are a few other good ones as well. Pastor Bob has covered the issue of Bible translations quite thoroughly in a previous Sunday school series so I’ll post link to this material on our church website.
Ok, but if the Bible is the Word of God, isn’t also a book of science?
Well, yes and no. The Bible does show some of the scientific knowledge people had of that day (ex. Basic anatomy, Mosaic law, directions for a sea-worthy ark). , it often uses metaphorical terminology or speaks to the level of knowledge people had about their world (the sun rising and setting).
Some critics will tell you that parting of the Red Sea was impossible.
Can you think of events in the Bible that critics say couldn’t have happened?
Believers in the resurrection of Christ have a hard time believing the event described in the following passage actually occurred:
Jonah being swallowed by a fish
Critics may ask, what fish could swallow a man alive?
How could a man actually survive in the belly of a fish?
Joshua 10:12-13
On the day the LORD gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the LORD in the presence of Israel: "O sun, stand still over Gibeon, O moon, over the Valley of Aijalon."
So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the Book of Jashar. The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day.
Critics may ask:
To accomplish this would God have stopped the rotation the earth?
And in so doing, would the sudden stop throw everything off the planet?
Answer:
Matthew 19:26b with God all things are possible.
Including slide …
This leads to another question: Can the existence of God or the accuracy of the Bible be proven scientifically?
Does anyone know what the scientific method is?
The essential elements of a scientific method are iterations, recursions, interleavings, and orderings of the following:
· Characterizations (Quantifications, observations, and measurements)
· Hypotheses (theoretical, hypothetical explanations of observations and measurements)
· Predictions (reasoning including logical deduction from hypotheses and theories)
· Experiments (tests of all of the above)
We just can’t run experiments on events that occurred in the past.
Scientists recently conducted an experiment to see if prayer affected the recovery of a group patients. They separated some patience into two groups. The group prayed for, and the group not prayed for.
What do you think the outcome of the experiment was?
Answer: no difference in either group
Why do you think this was the case?
God never intended it that He nor His Word be proven scientifically. It would kind of throw out the whole faith thing.
Jesus told this parable in Luke 16:19-31
"There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
"The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried. In hell,[c] where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, 'Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.'
"But Abraham replied, 'Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.'
"He answered, 'Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my father's house, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.'
"Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.' " 'No, father Abraham,' he said, 'but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.'
"He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.' "
Would everyone receive the Gospel if given scientific proof?
Even if we had scientific proof, some still wouldn’t believe.
The type of proof we need to use is that which is used in our courts of law.
How does a jury arrive at a verdict?
Evidence.
And there is tons of evidence declaring that God exists and the Bible is accurate. We discussed the remarkable consistency of the Bible. The events are backed up by numerous extra-biblical sources. If you’d like to explore this topic further, you can read, “More Than A Carpenter,” “Evidence That Demands A Verdict,” and “More Evidence That Demands A Verdict” by Josh McDowell.
Again, I think most unbelievers choose not to be challenged by God and His Word. They are just ducking this issue by claiming the unreliability of the Bible.
What would you tell someone who says the Bible just can’t be trusted?