Believe in the word of god

Recently, I had the humbling opportunity to preach to a gathering of Christian workers who serve in a difficult part of the world. Only a handful of churches exist in their region. Some live in cities where no one, other than the workers, has confessed Jesus Christ as Lord. Open resistance, anti-Christian rants, rejection of biblical authority, and denial of Jesus as the God-Man and Savior prove to be the daily atmosphere in which they live.

Yet they seek to live as Christ’s followers in that setting, laboring for the chance to tell these people about the God of Holy Scripture and the good news of Jesus Christ. I listened to reports of some conversions, small house churches gathering for worship, disciple-making conversations, and the slow penetration of unreached people groups. Here’s what gripped me: Only by the proclamation of God’s Word and powerful answer to prayer will any of the people of this region believe the gospel. After many conversations and lots of listening, I came away convinced that these workers live by the Word and prayer. No tricks, no showmanship, no manipulation, no rallies, and no foolproof program; they depend upon the power of the Word of God for life and ministry.

Quite simply, these faithful gospel workers believe in the sufficiency of God’s Word for the way that they live as Christians and for their ministries.

Should we rely upon the sufficiency of Scripture any less? Do we think that our more sophisticated, Christianized arena of life and ministry can depend upon other things, with Scripture as one of numerous tools in our spiritual arsenal? I fear that we sometime fall into that tragic allurement of the world to go soft on Scripture’s sufficiency.

No doubt, few of us would readily admit to neglecting to live and minister apart from the sufficiency of Scripture! Yet in practice, we sometime profess one thing while doing another. We say that we believe the Bible to be God’s infallible and inerrant Word, and that it is sufficient for life and practice. But our life and practice may prove otherwise. To help my own life and practice, and perhaps yours, too, let’s consider a few evidences that we believe in the sufficiency of Scripture. I’m sure that we could add much more to this list, but I hope that it will serve as a starter to spur much more meditation on living in the sufficiency of God’s Word.

1. Theological Refinement

Rather than simply following tradition or preferences or the influence of power brokers or popular trends, one who depends on Scripture’s sufficiency will regularly test his understanding of God’s Word. He will be changed, sharpened, and refined theologically by proper interpretation of the Word (2 Tim 2:15). One sees this worked out in Apollos, who as an eloquent and mighty man in the Scriptures still lacked theological clarity concerning Christology. He relied on Scripture’s sufficiency, so gladly received the instruction of Priscilla and Aquila, finding himself sharpened for future ministry (>Acts 18:24–26).

2. Bread and Life

Resting in the sufficiency of the Word can be found in one’s appetite. Instead of finding deepest satisfaction in other things, even good things, one who lives in the sufficiency of Scripture hungers for the Word as his bread and life. He grows in his understanding of what Jesus declared to the adversary, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Matt 4:4). The Word is “more desirable than gold, yes, than much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb” (Psa 19:10).

3. Conviction and Correction

Instead of refusing to admit personal sin and areas of disobedience, when one lives in the sufficiency of Scripture, then he humbly bows and submits to the conviction and correction meted out by the Word. And it comes regularly! When Paul confronted Peter over his aloofness toward the Gentile believers in Antioch upon the Judaizers’ arrival, the issue at hand in Peter’s behavior was his failure to be “straightforward about the truth of the gospel.” How would Paul correct him? He relied on the sufficiency of the Word spoken to the notable apostle, to convict him and bring correction (>Gal 2:11–14).

4. Direction and Discernment

In Scripture sufficiency, we turn to Scripture for direction, clarity, understanding, and discerning the times rather than simply following the popular notions of the day. When Paul visited Jerusalem with Barnabas, he took along Titus as somewhat of a test case concerning where the powers that be stood on the gospel. He sought to stand on the Scripture alone for his understanding of the gospel, and would not cower even to those in power if they swayed from it. Fortunately, he found satisfaction with them that they, as well, relied on the sufficiency of the gospel (>Gal 2:1–10).

5. For Conversion

In the sufficiency of Scripture, we trust the power of the gospel read, talked about, discussed, and proclaimed for the conversion of the unbelieving. We refuse to resort to gimmicks, manipulation, easy-believism, or plucking unripe fruit in order to impress others. We believe that “the gospel… is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (>Rom 1:16–17). Spending several days with scores of Christian workers living among unreached people groups reinforced this truth. They rely on the power of the gospel and prevailing prayer—period—to see the conversion of the people for whom they weep for their salvation.

6. Praying

We pray Scripture, when we believe it to be sufficient, seeing its truth as the foundation for our prayers. As Don Whitney writes in his new book, Praying the Bible, “[T]he Spirit of God will use the Word of God to help the people of God pray increasingly according to the will of God” (37). We find the disciples doing this in >Acts 4:24–30, as they asked the Lord for boldness to speak the gospel. They rooted their petition in God’s revelation of Himself as Creator and His Sovereign Lordship manifested in His Christ (Pss 146:6; 2:1).

7. Worship

When we live in the sufficiency of Scripture, we fill our worship with the truth of Scripture, believing that, as it has been well said, “When Scripture speaks, God speaks.” Merely appealing to emotions or entertainment or crowd-pleasing will not do when one is convinced of Scripture’s sufficiency. Instead, the believer will find that while reading privately and in the public reading of Scripture (1 Tim 4:13), the Word brings him into the presence of the Lord with expressions of praise, adoration, awe, and thanksgiving. The Word believed leads to worship.

I’ve only touched the surface of the characteristics of those relying upon the sufficiency of God’s Word. Keep adding to it in your own meditations. Let this brief look serve as a reminder that believing that Scripture is sufficient affects life and practice.

Photo credit: ©GettyImages/Maridav

Why do I believe the Bible is the word of God? How do we know the Bible is really God’s word? Should Christians believe the Bible is God’s word since so many say it is not?

The study of Scriptural inerrancy and infallibility is a subject you can dedicate your whole life to learning and still have more to learn. However, all Christians should be able to generally answer the question, “Why Should I believe the Bible is the word of God?”

Here are 5 reasons I believe the Bible is the word of God.

1. For me to believe the Bible is the word of God, I first need to believe in God, which I do for these 4 reasons.

It is impossible to believe the Bible is the word of God if you don’t first believe that God exist. To even consider the possibility that a book is the inspired word of God, you first have to at least be open to the possibility of the existence of God.

One reason non-Christians often feel Christians are so foolish for believing that the Bible is the word of God is because they think Christians use circular logic. They believe that Christian believe the Bible is inspired by God because we believe the Bible and the Bible says it is inspired by God. In other words, the world believes Christians believe in God because we blindly believe the Bible.

However, a Christians faith in God must not be rooted in their blind faith in the Bible. Rather, our trust that the Bible is the word of God must be built on the foundation of our faith in God. Before you can be a Christian you must at least be a theist. A theist is someone who believes in God or gods. You don’t have to be a Christian to believe that a divine being exists. But to be a Christian you first need to believe that a divine being does exist.

So if I don’t believe in God just because the Bible tells me to believe in God, why do I believe in God? Well, besides the faith God has given me, this question is really what the field of apologetics is all about. In summary, however, I believe there are at least four clear and logical arguments for the existence of God which I have come to call the 4 Cs: Causation, Creation, Conscience, and Christ.

For a full explanation of these points, you can reference my article/video called Four Arguments for the Existence of God Anyone Can Use. Here’s a brief explanation of each point:

Causation refers to the fact that we live in a cause and effect universe. Therefore we live in a universe that demands an eternal first cause that did not need to be caused itself. In other words, only God can explain how the first cause happened.

Creation refers to the fact that we live in a universe that is finely tuned and extremely ordered. Randomness does not create order, especially over long-periods of time. Therefore, since we live in a very ordered existence, there must be a higher power doing the ordering. The world is clearly full of natural designs that follow laws and principles. If there is a design, their logically must be a designer.

Conscience refers to the fact that there is a universal moral law that all humans recognize even if they do not obey it. No matter where you go in the world, theft is always wrong. But if the world is full of different cultures and environments, why do humans consistency recognize good and evil? Without God the truth of good and evil would not exist because there would be no absolute standard. Without God absolute truth does not exist. Without absolute truth good and evil do not exist. But since good and evil do exist, it is only logical to conclude that God exists.

Christ is the final fact that there is a God. The evidence for the existence of Christ, the miracles of Christ, and most importantly the resurrection of Christ are overwhelming compared to other well-established facts in history. The resurrection is not a question of science; it is a question of historicity. The question should not be, “Could the resurrection happen?” Rather, the more objective question is, “Did the resurrection happen?”  If you go into this investigation concluding that miracles are impossible, you are playing with a stacked deck. When you look at the normal accepted evidence for questions of historical fact, the resurrection has all the reliability as any other historical event.

In summary, the first reason I believe the Bible is the word of God is because I believe in God. When I believe in the existence of God, this then allows me to explore the possibility of whether or not God divinely sent humans his words and recorded them in the form of the Bible.

1. I believe the Bible is the word of God because it is divinely consistent.

Have you ever played the game “telephone?” If not, you start with a large group of people sitting in a circle. One person starts by whispering a phrase into the ear of the person next to them, who then whispers the same phrase to the next person, until finally the phrase gets whispered all the way around the circle back to the person who originally whispered the phrase. The reason the game is fun is because by the time the phrase returns to the original person, it is a completely different string of words, most of the time totally unintelligible.

Humans, simply put, are not good at communicating. Most of the problems in the world start because of a lack effective communication. How many fights in one marriage have started simply because the husband and wife could not understand the other person’s perspective? How many car accidents have occurred because people misinterpreted the traffic signals? How many emails have been the beginnings of the end of a friendship because one person read too much into the tone, not the actual words written?

Consistent communication is impossible over a long period of time. Ask any business owner or leader, and no matter how many checkpoints they put in, they will always tell you there is no getting around the “human error” factor. It’s just simply unavoidable.

This is one of the many reasons the Bible proves itself to be divinely inspired. Written over 1500 years from the beginning of the Old Testament to the completion of the New Testament, with over 66 books, and with over 40 different authors, it is a divine miracle the message of each page of Scripture is directly linked to the one theme: God seeking to save sinners through the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The gospel is the “good news” that God saves sinners. From Genesis to Revelations, the theme of the story that keeps the pages moving forward is God’s pursuit to save the lost. And at the heart of the gospel is Jesus Christ.

In summary, there is no human way possible that the Bible could be so cohesively revolved around the gospel of Jesus Christ. The only explanation available in light of its consistency – and to see its consistency you simply have to read it yourself – is that the Bible is really God’s inspired word.

1. I believe the Bible is the word of God because of its historical integrity.

The integrity of the manuscripts of Scripture is a huge topic. In short, however, many claim that because there are so many manuscripts and the originals no longer exist, it must be impossible to trust the historical reliability of these documents.

Logically, however, there is more security in having many copies rather than having one original. Which is harder: To alter one copy or to alter thousands? Since we have more copies of biblical manuscripts than any other ancient text in human history, we can be sure the Bible we have has been unaltered. This evidence is remarkable and is highly convincing when comparing the Bible to other historical documents. In the article on GotQuestions.org titled “Is the Bible Reliable” it states:

The Bible has more empirical support, a shorter time between original writing and surviving copies, and a greater number of source manuscripts than any other ancient work, by far.

For example, there are ten copies of the works of Julius Caesar, the earliest from 1,000 years after he wrote, with no way to know how well those copies represent the originals. There are eight copies of the works of the historian Herodotus, the earliest from 1,400 years after he wrote. Archaeologists have found 643 manuscript copies of the works of Homer, allowing us a 95 percent confidence in the original text.

For the New Testament, there are currently more than 5,000 manuscripts, with most early copies anywhere from 200 to 300 years later, and some less than 100 years later. This gives a better than 99 percent confidence in the contents of the original text.

In short, we not only have objective reasons to claim the Bible is reliable, but we cannot call it unreliable without throwing out almost everything else we know of ancient history. If the Scriptures don’t pass a test for trustworthiness, no records from that era can. The Bible’s reliability is proven in both its historical accuracy and its accurate transmission.”

1. I believe the Bible is the word of God because it has self-authenticated itself through accurately recording the past, accurately interpreting the present, and accurately predicting the future.

The word “self-authenticating” sounds contradictory at first. However, if the word of God is actually the authority on truth, logically it would be impossible for an outside authority to authenticate the Bible as true or not.  In other words, it’s the person who makes an incredible claim who has the burden of proof. So what evidence does the Bible provide for itself that it is the word of God?

We already talked about one form of evidence in point 1. The consistency in the Bible’s message is a divine act. However, other strong pieces of evidence the Bible provides for itself is through its accuracy in recording the past, it’s accuracy in interpreting the present, and its accuracy in predicting the future.

When the Bible’s record of history corresponds to archeological evidence, the Bible is providing the necessary evidence for its historical integrity. If the Bible presented a worldview that did not fit with the reality of our lives, there would obviously be reasons to doubt its authenticity. However, Christians find comfort in that the Bible gives us an accurate way to interpret our world and our lives that is consistent with our personal experiences. Lastly and perhaps most convincingly, the Bible has accurately predicted the future through its prophetic writings already. Messianic prophecies in the Old Testament were fulfilled in the New Testament through Jesus.  The Bible will authenticate itself again when the prophecies not yet fulfilled get fulfilled in God’s timing.

Another example of the Bible’s prophecy coming true is its claim Jesus made about its durability. Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” (Mark 13:31) Throughout the history of the world, God’s word has been under attack.  As early as the seventh century BC, the sinful kings and leaders before King Josiah tried to forget God’s written law, but God allowed Josiah to find the book of the law once more (2 Kings 22). Antiochus IV Epiphanes, around the time of 170BC, made it punishable by death to have a copy of the Scriptures in one’s possession.

During the first 300 years after Christ, the Roman Empire did all it could to burn every copy of the New Testament. As time went on, the Catholic Church forbade anyone from reading and interpreting the Scriptures other than the official Catholic Church. Many during the Reformation lost their lives over the fight to have the Holy Scriptures printed and accessible in the people’s common languages.

But despite all the opposition to the Scriptures, there are still more copies of the original manuscripts than any other book written in all of history. Within the last 50 years, the Bible has been printed nearly 4 billion times. Coming in at a distant second is Quotations from the Works of Mao Tse-tung at 820 million copies printed, with third place going to Harry Potter at 400 million.

Why is this important? This is important because it proves that what the Bible says is true. Again, Jesus said in Mark 13:31, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” Despite all the opposition, despite all the time that has passed, despite all the claims that the Bible is not reliable, the Bible’s claims and predictions are still coming true. We can trust the Bible because the Bible proves itself true. Jesus said that his words will never pass away, and they haven’t despite many attempts by unbelievers. You can deny God’s word, but you can’t destroy it.

This is also important because this is another reason why we must never trust “new discoveries” of books people think should be added to the Canon. For example, many people claim that the Gospel of Thomas found in 1945 in Egypt should be a part of the Bible. Besides the fact that the content of this book does not match with the doctrines of the true word of God, the true word of God would never disappear for such a long period of time.

1. I believe the Bible is the word of God because of my personal experiences.

One of the requirements for a book to be included in the canon of Scripture is historical fruitfulness. In other words, if the Holy Spirit truly inspired a book, the words in that book will produce good fruit in the lives of Christians (Isaiah 55:11, 2 Timothy 3:16).

Like the church has historically recognized the validity of Scripture through the fruit God produces by his word, this has been my personal experience too. I believe the Bible is the word of God because through the Bible God has taught me truth that has directly impacted my life. Through the Bible my personal relationship with God has deepened.

While I know that my personal experience is not evidence for someone else to believe the Bible, I do believe that people must first personally experience the power of God’s word in order for them to fully believe it is divinely inspired. Hebrews 4:12 is not just a theoretical idea. It has proved true for millions of Christian:

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

The first thing each and every Christian must fully realize is that the Holy Bible is truly the inspired and infallible Word of God.

There are many liberal Christians who are starting to question the validity and authenticity of the Bible. I will not use this article to debate the origins of the Bible, all of the authors who wrote the books, and how the different translations came into being. There are plenty of good books at your local Christian bookstore that deal with this topic very extensively.

After studying the Bible in its complete entirety – there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that all of the Bible is God-breathed – that all of it has come directly to us from God the Father through the Holy Spirit.

For those of you who believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible, and that all of it has truly come to us from God the Father.

I will use this article to give you some extremely powerful verses from Scripture to show you that not only did all of the Bible come direct to us from God the Father through the Holy Spirit to all of the authors who wrote all 66 books of the Bible – but I will also give you some powerful verses from the Bible showing you how powerful the actual words of the Bible really are, and how they can also help to change and transform you into the kind of person that God really wants you to become in Him.

The actual words of the Bible are anointed by the Holy Spirit Himself – and they have the full ability to completely change and transform you if you are willing to work with the divine truths that are contained in the actual words.

Jesus says in the Bible that you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. However, you first have to know what the real truth is before the truth can start to work to set you free.

This is why Kind David said we must meditate on the words of the Bible – so we can find out what their true meaning is and how all of these divine truths can apply to our daily lives. Meditating on the Bible means to think about, to chew on, to try and figure out the meaning of all of the different verses in the Bible.

Though the Book is long, God has made it as simple and easy as He possibly could. Think about this. There is only one Bible. In one Book, God has given us everything we need to know about Himself, His Son Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, the basics of our salvation through His Son Jesus, how He wants us to live this life, the things that He wants us doing, and the things that He does not want us to be doing.

In this one Book are all the ways and commandments of our Lord, along with all the information we are ever going to need on what is awaiting all of us on the other side when we die and cross over – heaven for the saved and hell for the unsaved.

I believe the number one reason God created the human race was for intimate fellowship. Even to the amazement of the angels in heaven, God seems to have some type of special longing and love for the human race.

The fact that God would send His one and only Son Jesus down to our earth in the flesh to go through the worst form of physical death at the time He came, all just to bring us back to Himself, really does show us how much God really does love all of us.

The Bible tells us that the love that God has for all of us is like a “consuming fire.” These two words are showing us a love that is of maximum intensity. With this kind of intense, passionate love that God has for all of us, I believe He is trying to tell all of us one main thing – and that one main thing is that He is looking to enter into a one-on-one, personal, love relationship with each one of us.

Think about this – that the one and only all-powerful God of the entire universe is looking to make a direct, personal connection with you on an individual and unique basis.

If you really step back and look at the big picture and all the things that we see in this life – what is the one thing that most of us long for in this life? What is the one thing that will make you cry when you see this portrayed on the movie screens?

It is the longing for a true soul mate. It is the longing for a pure, true, and unconditional love from a person of the opposite sex. There is nothing that can satisfy the deeper longings of your soul the way that true love can. However, there is just one small catch with this scenario. Even though some of you may have found your true soul mates in this life, there is still one more thing that has not been met.

No matter how perfect you think your mate may be – your mate is still not perfect like God is, since the Bible tells us that all men and women have sinned and have fallen way short of the glory of our God. What this means is that no matter how good of a love relationship you may have with your mate, that person is still not capable of giving you a perfect love because that person is not perfect in their very nature and personality.

Thus, every single one of us still has that little hole in our soul that just cannot seem to be filled with anything else in our lives.

No matter how much money we have, no matter how many material possessions we have, and no matter how many loving children we have – there is still something missing and none of these things can completely fill that little hole that is in all of our souls.

God has purposely left a vacuum, a hole, and a void in each one of our souls when He created us. And the only thing that can fill this hole and void is God the Father Himself, His Son Jesus Christ, and His Holy Spirit.

There is absolutely nothing else on this earth that can fill that empty void. People are literally chasing after the wind trying to find anything and everything to fill that void – and no matter how many lovers they have, no matter how many marriages they enter into, and no matter how many toys they buy with the money they have – nothing they chase after in this life will fill that hole in their souls.

The only thing that will fill that hole in your soul is finding, and then entering into a true, personal, love relationship with God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. There is nothing else that will fill that void!

Since God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are totally perfect in Their actual natures and have no dark side to Their personalities, then They, and only They, are the only Ones who are capable of giving you a perfect, pure, and unconditional love that no one else can give you in this life.

This is why the Bible tells us that we will find a peace that will pass all human understanding once we have accepted Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior and have become truly born again. That peace we will find is the result of finding the one true Person who can fill that empty void that is on the inside of each and everyone of us – and that one Person is God Almighty Himself.

However, once you have found God through accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, there is now something you must do. You must now grow in the knowledge of God and grow in the personal relationship that He wants to establish with you.

And how do you start to grow in the personal relationship He wants to establish with you and grow in the knowledge that He wants you to have about Him? By diving head first into the Bible!

When two lovers first meet and fall in love with one another, the first thing they naturally and instinctively want to do is to learn as much as they can about one another.

How can you truly fall in love with another person unless you first seek to know everything you can about your lover, their past, where they have been, what they have been through, who are all of their friends and family, etc. Once you really fall into true love with someone, you will have a major hunger and desire to find out as much as you can about them and their past.

It’s the exact same way in our relationship with God. God obviously knows everything about each one of us since He is all-knowing, but we do not know everything about Him, His Son, or His Spirit. So the only possible way that we can learn all about God is to read and study from the Bible, since the Bible is the only Book that we have down here on this earth that will give us detailed information as to who the Three of Them really are.

If a true, born-again, Spirit-filled Christian is really in love with God, and really wants to deepen the personal relationship they have now established with Him – then the first thing that person will really want to do is to get into the Bible so that they can find out everything they possibly can about this awesome God of ours.

The more knowledge you gain about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit from studying the Bible – the stronger and deeper your personal relationship will become with the Three of Them.

As you will see in the Scripture verses listed below, there are several other incredible things that will start to occur in your life if you seek to study the Bible with the intentions on wanting to learn more about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit in order to deepen your personal relationship Them.

I will break these Scripture verses down under their appropriate captions below so you can see how powerful the Word of God really is, and how it can help change and transform the quality of your life if you are willing to study, learn, and seek to apply the divine truths that are in this incredible Book.

Study these verses very, very carefully. These verses are showing you how powerful and anointed the Bible really is. Since all of the Bible comes direct to us from God the Father, you can completely trust and rely on that what you will read from the Bible will be 100% pure, solid, God-truth.

1. All of Scripture is Given to Us By Inspiration From God the Father

These first two verses will specifically tell us, without any other possible interpretation, that all of the Bible has been given to us by “inspiration of God” through holy men who were “moved by the Holy Spirit” to write what they wrote!

In other words – all of the words in the Bible have come direct to us from God the Father through the Holy Spirit. The specific authors of the Bible then wrote under the guidance, inspiration, and illumination of the Holy Spirit.

This is why you can completely trust that what you will read from the Bible will be 100% pure, solid, God-truth! There is no other book on our earth that contains direct words from God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ other than the Holy Bible. God Himself has personally arranged that all of the revelation that He wants us to have in this life about Himself, His Son Jesus, and His Holy Spirit would all be contained in this one incredible Book.

Here are the two specific verses giving us this incredible revelation:

• “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16)
• “… knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Peter 1:20)

The first verse specifically tells us that all of Scripture, not just some or part of it, comes direct to us by inspiration from God the Father. The second verse then takes it one step further and tells us that the holy men of God who wrote the Bible, all wrote under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit Himself. It also says that no part of Scripture was of any private interpretation of these authors.

The first verse also lays out the groundwork as to what the Bible is going to be used for – for establishing solid Christian doctrine in the real truths of God, and for instruction in the knowledge and ways of God so that we may all be made complete and thoroughly equipped to go to work for God in the calling that He has set up for each one of our lives.

These two specific verses are powerful, foundational verses in which our study of Scripture has to be based on. If you do not believe that all of the Bible is truly the inspired and infallible Word of God – then the Holy Spirit is not going to move on you to start to really work the truths that are contained in the Bible to change, mold, and transform you into the kind of person that God wants you to become in Him.

Bottom line – if you want the divine truths that are contained in the Bible to really be able to change and transform you – then you will have to believe that all of the Bible comes direct to us from God the Father through the Holy Spirit. If you do not, then the Bible will have little or no transforming effect on you and your life.

2. The Word of God is Living and Powerful

As you will see in the following verses, the words that are contained in the Bible are living, powerful, and sharper than any two edge sword we can make on this earth.

In other words, the words in the Bible have God’s supernatural power and life in them. They are literally anointed by the power of the Holy Spirit Himself. This is why the words and the truths contained in the Bible have the supernatural ability to change and transform you into the kind of person that God wants you to become in Him.

That is why Jesus told the apostles to “feed” His sheep. When you read and study the Bible for increased learning, you are feeding yourself with direct anointed words from God Almighty Himself.

Many Christians who do not regularly feed off the Bible have no idea on what they are really missing out on. The Words that are in the Bible are pure, solid, spiritual food that have the supernatural ability to feed your mind, soul, and spirit. Nothing else will feed your inner man like reading from the Bible will.

Just like our human physical bodies need physical food to be able to survive – so does our mind, soul, and spirit. The food that we feed our physical bodies will not nourish our mind, soul, and spirits.

The only thing that can spiritually feed and nourish us on the inside are true, solid, spiritual truths. And the only true, solid, spiritual truths that can feed us to cause any kind of true spiritual growth to occur in this life are divine truths that come direct from God the Father and Jesus Christ.

There are no other spiritual truths from any other sources that we can feed off of that will cause any kind of true spiritual growth to occur in this life.

Any other source is just dead meat. It has no supernatural life or ability to change us because it is not coming direct from God the Father and thus has no anointing on it.

All other false religions and New Age type thinking have no supernatural ability to change and spiritually transform you in this life. Only the divine truths that are contained in the Bible have this supernatural ability.

Now here are 9 major power verses showing you how much supernatural life and power there really is in the Word of God.

• “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” (Hebrews 4:12)
• “So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:11)
• “Is not My word like a fire?” says the Lord, “And like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:29)
• “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63)
• “This is my comfort in my affliction, for Your word has given me life.” (Psalm 119:50)
• “Your words were found, and I ate them, and Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart …” (Jeremiah 15:16)
• “How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!” (Psalm 119:103)
• But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’ ” (Matthew 4:4)
• “… as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” (1 Peter 2:2)

Notice all of the food analogies that God is using to compare His Word with. What He is trying to tell us is that when you are studying the words that are contained in the Bible for increased learning – you are spiritually feeding yourself with supernatural nutrition!

I believe that all of the above Scripture verses are trying to tell us one main thing – that the Word of God is living, powerful, and real spiritual food for the soul and spirit of every person who is willing to feed off of it.

3. The Word of God is Pure, Solid Truth

If the Bible is telling us that all of Scripture is coming direct to us from God the Father through the Holy Spirit – then the next thing that the Bible will be telling us is that all of the words that are coming direct to us from God the Father are 100% pure, solid truth.

If God is all-perfect and all-powerful, then this means His intelligence and knowledge on all things is all-perfect. And if His knowledge on all things is all-perfect, then this means that all of the words that He is conveying to us in the Bible can be counted on as being perfect words, thereby giving us perfect knowledge.

This means that all of the Bible can be counted on as being 100% pure, solid, God-truth with no errors and mistakes. The Bible tells us that all humans will only know in part with what knowledge we are able to gain down here on this earth. Thus every book you read from human authors will never be totally perfect in the knowledge that the author is trying to transmit to you.

However, since all of the Bible is coming direct to us from God Almighty Himself – then the Bible is the only Book that we have down here on this earth that is totally and completely perfect in the knowledge that it is trying to transmit to us.

This is why the Bible has the ability to change your life. No other book on this earth has the amount of wisdom and knowledge that this Book has – and this is all because this knowledge and wisdom is coming direct to us from God the Father Himself.

Now here are 4 very good verses from Scripture that are specifically telling us that every word that proceeds from the mouth of God is 100% pure, solid truth.

• “Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him. Do not add to His words, lest He reprove you, and you be found a liar.” (Proverbs 30:5)
• “The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.” (Psalm 12:6)
• “For the word of the Lord is right, and all His work is done in truth. He loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.” (Psalm 33:4)
• “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.” (John 17:17)

Notice the first verse says that the words that come from God are “pure” words. The last verse then says that all of God’s words are “truth.” Put these two verses together and you get that all of the words that come from God are “pure truth.”

Pure means 100% pure – which means that all of God’s words are pure, solid truth with no errors or mistakes. This is why the Word of God is also called infallible and inerrant. If the Bible says that a thing is so – then it is so – end of discussion. You can literally bank your life on it!

4. The Word of God Can Sanctify You

If all of the words of the Bible are 100% pure, solid truth – then this means that all of the words in the Bible have the supernatural ability to sanctify you, especially since all of the Bible has the anointing of the Holy Spirit Himself on the entire Book.

God’s ultimate and highest aim for all of us after we become saved and born again is to sanctify us, to transform us, to mold and shape us into the express image of His Son Jesus. It is the job of the Holy Spirit to start this molding, transforming, and sanctifying work in us after we get saved.

However, the Holy Spirit needs something to work with in order to get this transformation process kicked into full gear – and that something is knowledge. God wants you to have full knowledge on exactly what it is He wants to change about you before He really starts to move you into this sanctification process with Him.

And where do you get the knowledge that will get God to start this sanctification process within you? From the Bible! There is no other book that we can learn and study from that will give us the direct knowledge that we will need from God the Father to get Him to start this sanctification process within us.

It’s the Word and the Spirit working together in a believer’s life that will get God to start working full force in their life so He can change them into the kind of person He really wants them to become in Him.

Here are several powerful verses from Scripture specifically telling us all of this. The first two verses will tell you that God can literally sanctify you by His Word.

• “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.” (John 17:17)
•  ” … that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.” (Ephesians 5:26)
• “How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed according to Your word. With my whole heart I have sought You; Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments! Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You. Blessed are You, O Lord! Teach me Your statutes.” (Psalm 119:9-12)
• “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.” (John 15:3)
• ” … and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.” (James 1:21)
• “For this reason we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe.” (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

Notice the last verse says that the Word of God can “effectively work in you.” This means when you start reading and studying the Bible in order to gain more knowledge about God – it will start to effectively work in you so you can start to change into the person God will want you to become in Him.

Just think of the power this Book has to dramatically change and transform the quality of your entire life. True inner happiness and fulfillment can only be found on the inside of your being, not on the outside with material things and possessions.

Hollywood is living proof that money, fame, and notoriety will not buy you true inner happiness. There are many in Hollywood who truly have what they think is “all” – yet they are miserable, unhappy, depressed, and go from one shrink to another – all in an effort to try and find what is still missing in their lives and why they cannot seem to find true inner happiness with all of the earthly wealth they have accumulated.

The only way to find true inner happiness in this life is to become saved and born again through the shed Blood of Jesus Christ – and then enter into a dynamic personal relationship with God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. From there, you are to start seeking after the knowledge about God and all of His ways by studying and reading the Bible on your own.

The personal relationship you will establish with God, and the knowledge that you will gain about God from reading and studying from the Bible is what will dramatically transform the quality of your life down here on this earth. Nothing else on this earth will do that for you!

5. The Word of God Will Give You Knowledge and Wisdom

The Bible tells us that we are to grow in the knowledge and ways of God. And the number one way in which we will grow in the knowledge of God is by reading and studying from the Bible.

There is no other way! If you do not seek to learn more about the Lord by studying from the Bible, then your spiritual growth in the Lord will stagnate and you will stop growing in Him.

There are no shortcuts to true spiritual growth in the Lord. You have to pay your dues, and those dues are that you have to gain and increase in knowledge about God and all of His ways before the Holy Spirit will start you on the road to true spiritual growth. And the only Book that will give you the knowledge that will cause true spiritual growth to occur in this life is the Bible.

And not only has God given us everything that we will ever need in this one Book – but He has also given us His Holy Spirit, whose main job is to “teach us all things” and to “guide us into all truth.”

Several verses I will list below will tell you that the Holy Spirit Himself will be the One who will personally open up the meaning of Scripture for you so that you can see the knowledge that God the Father is trying to transmit to you through this Holy Book!

This is a direct supernatural work that can be done for you by the Holy Spirit if you are willing to go into a seeking mode with Him when you study the Bible.

Here are several good verses telling us that the Word of God can impart true knowledge and wisdom to us, and that God does want us growing in the knowledge of Him, His Son, and His Holy Spirit.

• “… but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 3:18)
• “And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures.” (Luke 24:45)
• “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My Name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I have said to you.” (John 14:26)
• “However, when He, the Spirit of Truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth …” (John 16:13)
• Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:31)
• “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another …” (Colossians 3:16)
• “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path … The entrance of Your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple … Direct my steps by Your word, and let no iniquity have dominion over me.” (Psalm 119:105, 130, 133)
• “My son, give attention to My words; incline your ear to My sayings. Do not let them depart from your eyes; keep them in the midst of your heart; for they are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh.” (Proverbs 4:20)

All of the above verses are showing us how powerful the words that are coming direct from God and Jesus really are. The Word of God can truly change your life for the better – but only if you are willing to spend some good quality time seeking to understand what is in this most incredible Book.

6. The Word of God Will Stand Forever

The last thing you will really need to grasp on the power of the Word of God is that the Word of God will last and stand forever – both in this life and the next life to come, which will be heaven.

Here are 3 very good verses from Scripture telling us that the Word of God is not chained and that it will endure to all generations – both in this life and the next life to come, which means forever!

•  “… for which I suffer trouble as an evildoer, even to the point of chains; but the word of God is not chained.” (2 Timothy 2:9)
•  “Forever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven. Your faithfulness endures to all generations …” (Psalm 119:89)
• “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of God stands forever.” (Isaiah 40:8)

Not only will your study of Scripture profit you in this life, but it will also profit you in the next life to come – which will be heaven.

I personally believe that we still continue to study the Bible even when we all enter into heaven. I do not believe any one human can truly master the Bible in this lifetime. There is simply way too much knowledge, wisdom, and revelation that is contained in this one Book for any one human to be able to fully grasp all of it in this lifetime.

I believe that the Bible is like a treasure chest that has no bottom to it. And to think that all of this knowledge is contained in just one Book! Only a true God of the entire universe could have put this much knowledge and revelation into one Book.

Conclusion

I will leave you with one last thought. Each Christian must make their own personal decision on this. Once you have become saved and born again by accepting Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior – you now have one of two choices to make.

You can either choose to press in and start seeking after God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit by spending regular quality time in the Bible to learn as much as you can about the Three of Them – or you can just leave well enough alone, figure you have as much of God as you will ever need in this life, and go on your merry way living for the world and the things of this world – never increasing your knowledge base about the Lord, and never really growing in the knowledge of God and all of His ways.

I am afraid most Christians in this day and age are taking the latter approach. Most Christians have either never read the Bible in its complete entirety, or have read very little of it in their own personal walks with the Lord.

This is one of the main reasons we have started up this website – to try and show everyone how much working knowledge there really is in the Bible, and how this knowledge can dramatically change and transform the quality of your life.

As I have shown you with all of the above Scripture verses, the Word of God is:

• Inspired, Infallible, and Inerrant
• Living, Powerful, and Anointed
• Pure, Solid Truth
• Sharper than Any Two-Edged Sword
• Can Spiritually Nourish Your Mind, Soul and Spirit
• Has the Ability to Sanctify and Cleanse You
• Has the Ability to Teach You, Guide You, and Direct Your Steps in this Life
• And Will Last and Stand Forever – Both in this Life and the Next Life to Come

What more can you ask for in one Book? Bottom line – there is simply no other book on our earth that has this amount of unlimited knowledge direct from God Himself. And it is all there for the taking for anyone who wants to dive in and take the journey.

The most scrutinized and authenticated, scientifically and academically studied, carefully documented and transmitted piece of literature in history happens to make the internal claim to be the written word of God. Is the Bible true? And can you stake your life on it?

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By Patrick Morley
MIM Founder & Executive Chairman
Winter Park, Florida

One day I showed our Man in the Mirror Statement of Faith to a man having doubts about his Christian faith. Our Statement of Faith covers the usual subjects, like the deity of Jesus, the Virgin birth, the Holy Spirit, the Trinity, and so on. But point #1 deals with the inerrancy of Scripture.

Wanting to understand where he was stumbling, I asked if he would be willing to go through our Statement of Faith and mark each of the ten points as either “believe,” “don’t believe,” or “doubt.”

He responded, “Well, I can, but it’s pretty simple. If I could believe the first one—that the Bible really is the Word of God—then I would believe all of it.”

And there’s the heart of the issue: How can you have enough confidence to believe the Bible really is the Word of God? How can you settle the answer to the question, is the Bible true?

My goal is that by the end of this article you will have learned, or been reminded of, three compelling reasons that will give you more than enough confidence to affirm that in the Bible we find a flawless record of exactly what God wanted to say exactly the way He wanted to say it.

It would not be realistic to remember everything you’re about to read. For that reason, I urge you to consider the evidence carefully, make your decision, drive a stake in the ground, and then in the future be guided by the memory of the confidence you had when you finished this article.

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Reason #1: What the Bible Says About Itself

First, because I think most men want to believe the Bible is the Word of God, let’s consider what the Bible says about itself. No political, double talk here: The Bible unambiguously claims to be the Word of God.

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. (2 Timothy 3:16)

Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation of things. For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:20-21)

And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe. (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. 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. (2 Peter 3:15-16)

Every word of God is flawless; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him. Do not add to his words, or he will rebuke you and prove you a liar. (Proverbs 30:5-6)

Jesus said, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.” (John 17:17)

So is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. (Isaiah 55:11)

Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. (John 20:30-31)

Of course, I could claim to be the king of Norway, but that wouldn’t make it so. Nevertheless, it’s not insignificant that the Bible so clearly claims to be the Word of God.

Reason #2: The Formation of Canon

The second reason you can believe the Bible is the Word of God is because of how the Bible came into existence.

Hebrews 1:1 says, “God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways.” They were men like Moses, Samuel, David, Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul, and many more—40 in all.

No committee sat down and said, “Let’s write a Bible.” No one assembled 40 authors together for a writer’s conference.

Instead, the Bible was organically assembled as inspired human authors each spoke to the unique needs of their own generations. Moses was the first to write, and 1,500 years later disciples like Peter, John, Matthew, Luke, and Paul wrapped up the Scriptures with a flurry that we call the New Testament.

Those men wrote down what God told them to write—usually on a parchment or a scroll made from an animal hide. Sometimes they jotted down direct quotes, like, “I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God” or “If my people would but listen to me.” Other times, they wrote what they experienced, like Nehemiah rebuilding the wall. Or what they felt, like David in Psalms. Or what happened in a previous age, like Moses composing Genesis.

Old Testament Canon

Even after the scrolls were copied and circulated, still no one had the idea of a canon. Canon is just a technical term for Bible; it means “rule” or “standard.” It’s a fixed list of books that religious scholars consider to be Scripture—“the inspired word of God.”

How did the particular books in our Old Testament become canon? That was based on how much the scrolls were used and how widespread their authority became. The Pentateuch, the writings of Moses and first five books of the Bible, is the most prominent example.

Just like the Bible is read in churches today, the Law of Moses was read every week in local synagogues. “For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath” (Acts 15:21).

No one knows for sure, but at some point the idea for a “closed canon” (which means, “That’s all, folks!”) reached a tipping point. Some scholars think that may have happened as early as 300 BC.

The Septuagint

That date, or one close to it, had to be the case, since the Hebrew Bible was translated into Greek by 200 BC. As it happened, Jews had started speaking Greek and many had lost their ability to read Hebrew. For us, that would be like American Catholics trying to read a Latin Bible.

The story goes that the twelve tribes of Israel each sent six scholars (70-72 in all) to Alexandria, Egypt, to translate the Hebrew to Greek in 70 days. We call it the Septuagint (Latin for “seventy”).

That’s quite remarkable, because all 39 of our Old Testament books are included in the Septuagint (along with several apocryphal books included in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles)!

So our Old Testament has been a fixed list of books since at least 200 BC.

The Bible of Jesus

The Old Testament was the Bible that Jesus read and quoted. In fact, some of Jesus’ quotations of the Old Testament match the Septuagint version—which means that Jesus felt comfortable using a translation.

Jesus believed the Old Testament was the word of God. He would often say, “It is written…” or ask, “Have you not read…?”

He also believed the Old Testament was factually true. He referred to Adam, Eve, Abel, Noah, Moses, Lot, Elijah, and Jonah as historical figures. And He said the Scriptures cannot be altered, abolished, broken, or pass away.

Jesus had the distinct impression the Old Testament was all about Him! After the resurrection, He told His disciples, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms” (Luke 24:44). Don’t miss that Jesus vouched for the Hebrew Bible!

That’s how the Old Testament came to exist, but how did we get the New Testament?

New Testament Canon

After the death of Jesus, His disciples transmitted information about Him orally (“oral tradition”) for approximately 20 years.

However, Christianity was growing into a powerful force. So the apostles and their disciples started to write about Jesus’ life and teachings, and also about the early church. Luke, who penned a gospel and Acts, put it this way:

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, 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, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. (Luke 1:1-4)

Toward the end of the first century, a collection of Christian writings took shape and began circulating among the churches. Not all of those writings, however, were of canonical merit. For example, during the Roman persecution, when their oppressors demanded that Christians hand over their Scriptures, some surrendered the Shepherd of Hermas (not “quite” canonical), but hid what they considered their “real” Bibles.

The four gospels as we know them—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—were the most revered by the church. They received wide circulation, along with the book of Acts. So did the writings of Paul, which were collected into a single body of work. Churches also began to archive copies of Paul’s epistles. A fixed list of books was starting to be recognized.

Just so you know, there were plenty of “kooks” back then, as now. For example, a heretic named Marcion proposed a one-gospel New Testament with a “purified” version of Luke (with Marcion doing the purifying) and 10 of Paul’s 13 epistles. He appeared to be revising a list of books already in use. Those kinds of challenges were actually good, because they pushed the orthodox church to clarify the canon.

“Hey, Why Don’t We Make a New Testament?!”

Around 180 AD, Irenaeus first mentioned the idea of a “New Testament” to go with the “Old Testament” canon. That was important because Irenaeus was a disciple of Polycarp, who was a disciple of John—the original “eyewitness” John. And Irenaeus was very well respected, so the idea started to catch on.

But it was finally Athanasius, the bishop of Alexandria, who once and for all nailed down the official New Testament. There was a tradition; every Easter, the bishop of Alexandria would send a letter and, among other things, give his take on the “authoritative” books. In his 367 AD Easter letter, Athanasius acknowledged all 27 of our New Testament books. And they were books already in wide use. So the official sync date for the New Testament we use today is 367 AD.

That list was affirmed at synods (official religious meetings) at Hippo in 393 AD and Carthage in 397 AD, both of which were attended by Augustine. After that, the canon was closed with no serious challenges since.

The church didn’t create the canon; they just recognized the canon already in use. And that’s how our New Testament came to exist.

And for those of us who like bullet points, here’s the technical sequence for how the New Testament canon was created:

1. Apostolic authority: those who were eyewitnesses
2. Oral tradition: knowledge spread through oral repetition
3. Written tradition: the oral tradition was committed to writing
4. Canonization: the writings became “official” based on—according to theologian J. I. Packer—apostolic authority or authentication, Christ-honoring content in line with existing teaching, and continuous acknowledgement and fruitful use.
5. Closing of canon

Would a God powerful enough to inspire the Bible to be written not also be powerful enough to preserve it?

That explains the formation of canon, but whatever became of those original animal hides and parchments? That’s what we’ll talk about next—the transmission of canon.

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Reason #3:  The Transmission of Canon

The third reason you can have confidence in the Bible is the scientific accuracy and reliability of how it has been transmitted through the centuries.

We don’t possess any of the 66 original manuscripts of the Bible. All were lost or destroyed long ago, and we have no record of how that happened. On the other hand, we do possess an abundance of handwritten manuscript copies—more than for any other ancient literature by an exponential factor. Yet some of those manuscripts contain human errors made by the ancient scribes who prepared them.

That’s not to say we don’t have an accurate, reliable Bible. We do. But how do we get from “no originals but copies with human errors” to a flawless record of exactly what God wanted to say exactly the way He wanted to say it?

We now graduate from canon formation to canon transmission. The objective is for you to sense the unparalleled scholarly precision and scientific rigor expended to preserve and, where needed, recover accurate copies of the original Old and New Testaments.

This section explains how those original manuscripts of God’s inspired word—what scholars call the “autographa” or original autographs—were preserved and, where copy errors were made, recovered.

The Transmission and Translation of the Bible

First, let’s discuss how the Bible has been transmitted from the originals to us today through copies.

Once a Prophet or Disciple published his scroll or letter, the demand for copies was immense. But without printing presses, everything had to be hand copied. So, a publishing industry of professional “copyists,” or scribes, cropped up to duplicate the handwritten manuscripts. Making copies of God’s word was a normal practice, even encouraged.

A copyist might work alone, but it would not be uncommon for a group of scribes to work together, have a supervisor, and create several copies of Bible scrolls at the same time. Seated in, say, a scriptorium, the supervisor would dictate, and the scribes would painstakingly copy it letter by letter, word for word.

Understanding their work as a sacred task, copyists were by nature exceedingly careful. When they finished a document, they would count the number of letters to verify accuracy. Nevertheless, because they were human, mistakes were made, which we’ll cover in a moment.

In addition to making copies in the original manuscript languages—Hebrew for the Old Testament and Greek for the New Testament—there was a demand for translations into other languages, too. First came translating the Hebrew Old Testament into Greek (the previously mentioned Septuagint). Then, as Latin replaced Greek as the international language, both the Old and New Testaments were translated into Latin (the Latin Vulgate).

The first printed Bible was the Guttenberg Bible in Latin. The Latin translations had survived until the Reformation, when Martin Luther translated the Bible into German. Others followed suit, and soon after, the Bible was translated into all the major languages.

The Most Reliable Old Testament Manuscripts

We have three main sources for copies of the Old Testament: the Masoretic Text, the Septuagint, and the Dead Seas Scrolls.

The Masoretic Text is the Old Testament in Hebrew. It was preserved by a sect of teachers and scribes, the Masoretes, who lived from the 7^th to 11^th centuries AD. As self-appointed keepers of the Hebrew Bible, they destroyed copies with errors to “purify” the Bible. And many had already been destroyed along with the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD. On the other hand, because of their meticulous practices, the Masoretic Text is considered the gold standard. It has been the base text for most Old Testament translations of the Christian Bible.

The 1947 discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls produced about 500 additional full or partial Old Testament manuscripts. The sect that copied the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran lived from about 200 BC until the fall of the Temple around 70 AD. The Dead Sea Scrolls predate the Masoretic Text by 1,000 years; yet they’re nearly identical, giving further credence to the accuracy of the Masoretic Text.

The Septuagint, the circa 200 BC Greek translation of the Old Testament, also gives scholars another source for comparing texts.

The New Testament

In contrast to the paucity of Old Testament manuscripts, there are about 5,000 existing full or partial Greek New Testament manuscripts.

What Kinds of Errors Are We Talking About?

Errors—mostly minor and typically related to grammar or spelling—were often re-copied into additional manuscripts, thereby transmitting the error.

We may not have any original manuscripts for books of the Bible, but because of the science of text criticism (described below), we know with certainty where all the mistakes are located.

The mistakes or errors in making copies of the Bible are called “variants.” Most variants are small, like a grammar or spelling error (“Amos” written as “Amon”), dropping a word (“Jesus Christ” in one place is written as only “Jesus” in another manuscript), adding a word or words, perhaps to clarify (“virgin” to improve Mary’s status with Joseph), or the accidental omitting of a word or two (“to him” in “the heavens were opened to him” in Matthew 3:16). And sometimes it appears a copyist may have tried to “improve” the manuscript (for smoother reading or theological clarification).

The errors are easy enough to imagine. Suppose I was dictating to you from a book, and I told you and two others to write down the word “to.” You write “to,” the second person writes “too,” and the third writes “two.”  Those are the kinds of problems that could creep into hand-copied manuscripts when humans heard or saw the wrong word.

How many of these variants are there? A widely used estimate of 200,000 New Testament variants is often used. It may be more. More importantly, how big of a problem do these variants present? Not much.

As one scholar said, if you took all the “unresolved” variants together, they would equate to about a half page in a 500-page book. Why are variants not a much bigger problem?

Text Criticism

Scholars have always engaged in “text criticism,” which is simply the science of comparing manuscripts to verify the most accurate translation.

Because all early Bible manuscripts were hand copied, text critics have identified all these variants, and they have been scrupulously codified and compared. Special scholars’ Bibles list all variants from manuscripts that differ in a table at the bottom of the page. I have one myself on my Logos Bible Software.

The concept is simple. When manuscripts don’t agree, scholars figure out which one is likely the accurate and authentic translation.

The bigger picture is that in the world of biblical studies, because 5,000 Greek New Testaments still exist, scholars have an astonishing amount to compare. As a result, every error, no matter how big or small, has been identified and cataloged.

Critical scholars spend their entire careers pouring over these variants. Thousands of scholars over hundreds of years have invested millions of hours attending symposiums, debating peers, presenting papers, writing for scholarly journals, publishing books, and teaching in seminaries to get this right.

The Bible is the most scrutinized, authenticated, scientifically and academically studied, carefully documented and transmitted piece of literature in history by an exponential factor—and it happens to make the internal claim to be the written word of God.

Conclusion

So is the Bible true? The idea behind this article is simple. The more confidence you have in the Bible, the more it will influence what you think, believe, say, and do.

If you can believe God is the ultimate author of Scripture, then it is not hard to imagine that before the first manuscript was ever written, the all-knowing God knew:

• The men He chose to write down His words would reflect their own personalities
• Their original manuscripts would be copied
• Those original manuscripts would be lost
• The copied manuscripts would contain human errors
• Science would ensure His words would be accurately preserved
• Faith would come by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God
• There would be more than enough evidence to conclude the Bible is the Word of God

Because of the reasons we’ve explored, you can have absolute confidence of this:

THE BIG IDEA: In the Bible we find a flawless record of exactly what God wanted to say exactly the way He wanted to say it.

Take note of the confidence you have in this moment that the Bible is the Word of God. Drive a stake in the ground.

And let that faith anchor your soul eternally in the grace of Jesus.

♦♦♦

December 8, 2021

Some questions come from people who are skeptical about the Christian faith. Some come from believers who have skeptical friends. And some come from believers who are struggling with the issue themselves.

Our question is found in the hearts of all three.

Who of us hasn’t wondered at times why we believe this ancient book is the revelation of the God of the universe?

Think about it for a moment: The Creator of all that exists reveals himself to a small group of former Egyptian slaves in a remote corner of the globe. Not to kings and emperors, or to scholars in leading universities, but to shepherds, fishermen, tax collectors, refugees. On documents which no longer exist so that we must depend on the copies that history has handed down to us. Through circumstances completely foreign to our culture and lives today.

Think of King Arthur and Camelot, and you envision ancient history. The Bible sitting on your shelf is more than twice that old. If we aren’t sure King Arthur existed or why he matters, what of this ancient book upon which we build our faith? Why should we believe it to be the word of God?

The Bible claims to be the word of God

This fact does not settle the issue, of course.

The Koran claims to be the word of Allah; the Book of Mormon claims to be the revelation of God. But at least we know that Christians do not believe something about the Bible which it does not claim for itself.

Paul was convinced that “all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). He meant the Old Testament, which was the Bible of his day.

Peter, the leader of early Christianity, considered Paul’s writings to be Scripture as well: “[Paul] 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 to the other Scriptures, to their own destruction” (2 Peter 3:16, my emphasis).

Jesus believed his words to be divinely inspired: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (Luke 21:33).

Speaking of the totality of biblical revelation, the writer to the Hebrews claims, “The word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).

Someone said, “God said, I believe it, and that settles it.”

His friend replied, “No, God said it and that settles it, whether I believe it or not.”

J. I. Packer called the Bible “God preaching.” Augustine described it as “love letters from home.”

The copies we possess are trustworthy

Now, let’s turn to objective evidence that the Bible is right in its self-description as God’s inspired, authoritative word.

We begin with the manuscript evidence. No original manuscript of any ancient book exists today. The materials used in that era could not stand the effects of elements and time.

For instance, we have only nine or ten good copies of Caesar’s Gallic Wars, none made earlier than nine hundred years after Caesar. Tacitus, the greatest ancient Roman historian, wrote fourteen books of his Histories; we possess only 4½, none made earlier than the tenth century AD. We can find only five manuscripts of any work of Aristotle, none copied earlier than fourteen centuries after Aristotle wrote the originals.

By contrast, we possess five thousand ancient Greek manuscripts of the New Testament and ten thousand copies in other ancient languages. Fragments and parts of these copies date back as early as thirty years after the originals were written. Complete versions of the Gospels, Acts, Paul’s letters, and Hebrews date to the early part of the third century. Revelation dates to the latter half of that century. Complete volumes date to the fourth century. Extensive quotations of Scripture in the letters of early Christians date to AD 100.

“Textual critics” are scholars who devote their attention to comparing ancient manuscripts and trying to produce a copy as close to the original as possible. Those who work with biblical texts believe that the Old and New Testaments we possess today are virtually identical to the originals. The only questions that remain affect matters of spelling, punctuation, and isolated verses. None relates to essential doctrines or practices of the faith.

Archaeology confirms the biblical record

Archaeological finds continue to give us confidence that the biblical writers accurately recorded history.

For instance, the Pool of Bethesda (John 5:2) was once dismissed as non-historical. Now, tour guides in Jerusalem point groups to its location in the northeast quarter of the Old City. I’ve seen the ruins myself.

We have a stone inscription documenting the life and office of Pontius Pilate; the ossuary (coffin) of Caiaphas, the High Priest of the crucifixion; an inscription found at Delphi that describes the work of Gallio, proconsul at Corinth (Acts 18:12-17); and scores of other artifacts that document the accuracy of biblical history and description.

The best test for the Bible

There are strong evidential reasons to believe the Bible is God’s word. But the best test comes from personal experience.

I once owned a 1965 Ford Mustang and found myself under its hood as often as I was behind its wheel. Chilton’s Car Repair Manual became my constant companion. I learned to trust its advice because it worked.

Try living by the Bible. Accept its Savior as yours. Make its principles the guideposts of your life. And you’ll learn for yourself that its words are the word of God.

What makes the Bible different from other religious books?

My grandfather was born before the turn of the twentieth century. In his lifetime, he saw the advent of the automobile, commercial airplanes, and the computer. But he never met a Muslim, a Hindu, a Buddhist, or a Mormon. Our question never occurred to him.

Today, it’s a common issue: Why do we believe the Bible is right and other religious books are wrong?

Other religions are just as sincere in their commitment to their sacred writings as Christians are to ours. Is it not the height of bigotry and hypocrisy to claim that our book is right and theirs are not?

In our post-9/11 world, there has been an explosion of interest in Islam and an accompanying cry for tolerance. When we claim that our holy book is true and theirs is not, aren’t we just as intolerant as those who attacked our nation?

Different paths, different mountains

Conventional wisdom these days dictates that the various religions are just different roads up the same mountain. It doesn’t matter which God you trust because they are all the same. Allah is Jehovah; Buddhists and Hindus seek the same God we worship. Different holy books are simply religious diaries. Who’s to say that your diary is right and mine is wrong?

Such an approach to world religions and their writings feels tolerant and hopeful. But is it true? Do other religions agree with this characterization of their faith commitments?

In a word, no.

Buddhist beliefs

Buddha taught that there is no “god,” despite the fact that some of his followers now worship him. He instructed his disciples to avoid all material desires that they might cease their sufferings. The Four Noble Truths and Noble Eightfold Path are the keys to enlightenment. The Tripitika is the oldest compilation of the rules, sermons, and doctrines of this approach to life.

Hindu beliefs

Hindus believe in thousands of territorial deities but no “Lord” of the universe; Brahman is the divine force that sustains the universe, not a personal God to be worshiped. The Rigveda, their earliest scriptures, refer to Brahman as the power that is present in religious sacrifices and actions. Their Upanishads glorify the concept of Brahman over other inferior forms of personal deities.

Muslim beliefs

Muslims believe that Allah (the Arabic word for God) is the one supreme ruler of the universe, that Jesus was a prophet but not the divine Son of God, and that “salvation” comes through obedience to the Koran. This book is Allah’s self-revelation through his prophet Muhammad. All other holy books are inferior to it, for its pages alone contain the very word of God.

Jewish beliefs

Jews believe that Yahweh revealed himself through the Laws and Prophets of their Scriptures, that Jesus was not the Messiah, and that the New Testament is not the Word of God. They base their hope of heaven on the mercy of God in response to their lives of obedience and morality.

Mormon beliefs

Mormons believe that God revealed himself in the Bible but also in their Book of Mormon, a history of the early peoples of the Western hemisphere. Joseph Smith translated the book from golden plates that he claimed to have received from the angel Moroni. Doctrine and Covenants contain further revelations received by Smith from God. The Pearl of Great Pricecontains more writings of Smith. They picture God as an eternal being of flesh and bone who had physical relations with Mary to produce Jesus. Salvation and heavenly rewards come through obedience to these revelations.

If any one of these religions is right, the others by definition are wrong. None believes that other religions are equally correct or divinely inspired. The scriptures that the various world religions trust do not describe different paths up the same mountain but very different mountains.

Examine the evidence

So far, we have demonstrated the fact that the world’s great religious books cannot all be right. In fact, if any of them is correct in its teachings regarding the supernatural and eternal, the others are by definition wrong.

So, how do we decide which documents to trust?

Examine the evidence for their truth claims.

Hindu documents, for instance, posit an afterlife filled with reincarnations. Is there any historical support or objective evidence for such a position?

Does objective, independent evidence exist to document the Buddha’s enlightenment or Muhammad’s experiences with Allah?

A number of cities, inscriptions, and places are described only in the Book of Mormon. To date, none have been found by archaeologists.

Conversely, independent evidence for the existence and deity of Jesus Christ is remarkable. Manuscript evidence documenting the trustworthy nature of the biblical materials is overwhelming. There are excellent reasons to believe the Bible is what it claims to be: the word of God.C

What makes the Bible different from other holy books?

In a word, Jesus.

He taught that no one comes to the Father except through him (John 14:6). The Bible was written to help us believe in him and find life in his love (John 20:31).

The sacred writings of the various world religions each tell a different story about the divine, the afterlife, and the purpose of life today. Different roads lead to different destinations. The road you choose determines where your trip will end.

Choose wisely.

Isn’t the Bible filled with contradictions?

Here is one of the most common ways skeptics justify their skepticism about the Bible. The question is based on the commonplace supposition that contradictions are bad. If you can find a statement I make that disagrees with something I’ve already said, you’ll feel justified in rejecting both. Even though one may be right. Even though they both may be.

Why?

Contradict the contradictions

We have Aristotle (384-322 BC) to thank or blame. In his desire to compile all knowledge into an organized system, he devised laws of logic as organizational tools.

One of them is called the law of contradiction: A cannot equal B and at the same time not equal B. A fish cannot also be a mammal, if a biologist like Aristotle is going to classify it. From then to now, we Westerners have adopted Aristotle’s law as the basis for determining all truth. If we can find a contradiction in the Bible, we have reason to dismiss its veracity.

But there’s a fly in the ointment. Aristotle applied his laws to physical and rational truth, not to spiritual or relational experience.

It may appear contradictory to claim that you love your children and yet sometimes wish they’d never been born. But if you’re a typical parent, both are sometimes true.

Jesus claimed to be fully God and fully man; God is three and yet one; the Bible is divinely inspired but humanly written; God knows the future but we have freedom to choose. Inside every essential Christian doctrine, there is a paradox, an apparent contradiction.

Many of the so-called contradictions in the Bible fit into such spiritual or relational categories. For instance, the Bible teaches that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Yet it also states clearly, “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness” (Romans 1:18). And it warns, “For those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger” (Romans 2:8).

How can God both love and hate? Don’t ask Aristotle. But you can ask any parent.

Not all truth fits into test tubes. My seventh-grade geometry teacher claimed that parallel lines never intersect. But to prove it, he’d have to draw them forever. Black and white are not the only crayons in the box.

Consider the context

The second category of apparent contradictions in the Bible is more historical and factual.

For example, here are two of the common questions I’ve been asked. Each is clarified when we understand the larger context of the text in question.

“The Old Testament teaches, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But Jesus told us to turn the other cheek. Which is right?”

Both.

Moses was dealing with an ancient culture in which blood vengeance was common and drastic. If you kill my son, I kill your entire family. To limit retribution to the actual criminal and crime was a great step forward.

On the other hand, Jesus was speaking to the issue of personal insult. People in his day used only the right hand in public (as the left was used for personal hygiene). To “strike you on the right cheek” (Matthew 5:39) with my right hand meant to slap you, a threat to your social standing but not your life. Here you are to forgive rather than punish.

“Matthew says that Judas hanged himself; the book of Acts says he fell down and died. Which is it?”

Matthew’s gospel does indeed record Judas’ suicide by hanging (Matthew 27:5). In Acts 1, Peter says, “Judas bought a field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out” (v. 18).

It may be that Judas’ body decomposed so that when the rope broke or was cut, it fell as Peter describes. Or it may be that the Greek word translated “hanged” is actually the word impaled (both meanings are possible) so that Peter describes more vividly the way Judas killed himself.

Either option is a possible way to explain the apparent contradiction.

When we consider the intended meaning of the text and its larger context, such apparent contradictions are resolved.

Check all the options

The third category of supposed contradictions is not the result of context.

For instance, 2 Samuel 24:1 states that the Lord incited David to take a census of the people; 1 Chronicles 21:1 records, “Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census of Israel.”

But the Jewish people saw all that happens as within the providence and permission of God, so that Satan’s activity (1 Chronicles) was permitted by the Lord and thus attributable to him (2 Samuel). And the people grew in their knowledge of God so that the Chronicler (writing four hundred years after 2 Samuel) could record Satan’s activity in more detail than the people had earlier understood.

Matthew 4 records Jesus’ temptations in a different order than does Luke 4. But neither claimed to be writing chronology, so the order is immaterial. One could set them in time order, the other in spiritual priority, for instance.

1 Kings 7:13 states that Huram, one of the builders of Solomon’s temple, came from the tribe of Naphtali; 2 Chronicles 2:14 says his mother was from the tribe of Dan. But she could have lived in the territory of Naphtali, or her parents could have come from both tribes.

The real contradiction

The next time someone claims the Bible is full of contradictions, ask him if he has read the Bible. Then ask if it is a contradiction to dismiss a book he hasn’t read. Then offer to help him study the Bible and meet its Author.

It is a contradiction to me that a holy and perfect God would want me to live in his perfect paradise.

I’m glad it’s not a contradiction to God.

Who decided what books should be in the Bible?

My earliest experience with the Bible was leafing through an ancient King James Version my parents kept in the guest room. The fountain-penned family tree calligraphied in the first pages fascinated me. The printed thees and thous made no sense—the begats even less. I assumed the entire thing had been handed from God to man in black leather.

Most people know better. They’ve heard somewhere along the way that some books were excluded from the Bible and wonder why. Maybe a group of church officials decided the whole thing. Maybe there were books that told a different story than the one we have in our Bibles. Maybe there was a smoke-filled room somewhere. Maybe there were hanging chads.

The actual story is nowhere near that interesting.

How the Hebrew Scriptures came to be

Christians typically call this section the Old Testament, but those who wrote the New Testament didn’t.

When Paul, writing from death row in Rome, asked Timothy for his scrolls and parchments (2 Timothy 4:13), he was asking for his copies of the only Bible he knew. Most scholars appropriately call these thirty-nine books the Hebrew Scriptures, in deference to the Jewish faith they express.

The Hebrew Bible was first divided into Law, Prophets, and Writings, the arrangement current in Jesus’ day (see Luke 24:44).

The Jews numbered the Scriptures as twenty-four books, combining Ezra/Nehemiah, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, and the 12 Minor Prophets as “The Twelve.” These books were written and compiled over centuries of use.

According to Jewish tradition, a council of rabbis and scholars met at Jamnia on the Mediterranean Sea in AD 90 and again in AD 118. They finalized the list of books as we have them today, recognizing what their people had accepted as God’s word for centuries.

How the New Testament joined the Old

Eventually, the Christian movement began recording its faith and doctrines as well. The eyewitnesses to Jesus’ life and ministry were dying or growing old. Fraudulent claims were beginning to appear. Believers needed a canon (“rule”) by which to measure truth and defend the faith. The New Testament was the result.

Over time, four criteria were developed for accepting a book as inspired.

1. The book must have been written by an apostle or based on his eyewitness testimony.

Matthew, the tax collector, was a disciple of Jesus before he wrote his gospel, as was John.

Mark was an early missionary associate of Paul (Acts 13:4-5) and was a spiritual son to Peter (1 Peter 5:13). Early Christians believed that he wrote his gospel based on the sermons and experiences Peter related to him.

Luke was a Gentile physician who joined Paul’s second missionary journey at Troas (note Acts 16:10, where Luke changes the narrative from “they” to “we”). He wrote his gospel and the book of Acts based on the eyewitness testimony of others (Luke 1:1-4).

Paul’s letters came from an eyewitness to the risen Christ (cf. Acts 9:1-6), as did the letters of James (half-brother of Jesus), Peter, Jude (another half-brother of Jesus), and John.

This criteria alone excluded most of the books suggested for the canon.

2. The book must possess merit and authority in its use.

Here, it was easy to separate those writings that were inspired from those that were not.

For instance, The First Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus Christ tells of a man changed into a mule by a bewitching spell but converted back to manhood when the infant Christ is put on his back for a ride (7:5-27). In the same book, the boy Jesus causes clay birds and animals to come to life (ch. 15), stretches a throne his father had made too small (ch. 16), and takes the lives of boys who oppose him (19:19-24).

It wasn’t hard to know that such books did not come from the Holy Spirit.

3. A book must be accepted by the larger church, not just a particular congregation.

Paul’s letter to the Ephesians was an early instance of a letter that became “circular” in nature, i.e., read by churches across the faith. His other letters soon acquired such status.

By the mid-second century, only the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were accepted universally by the church, as quotations from the Christians of the era make clear. Others were not considered to be inspired by God.

4. A book came to be approved by the decision of the church.

The so-called Muratorian Canon was the first list to convey the larger church’s opinion regarding accepted books of the New Testament canon. Compiled around AD 200, it represented the usage of the Roman church at the time. The list omits James, 1 and 2 Peter, 3 John, and Hebrews since its compiler was not sure of their authorship. All were soon included in later canons.

The list we have today was set forth by Athanasius in AD 367. His list was approved by church councils meeting at Hippo Regius in 393 and Carthage in 397. These councils did not impose anything new upon the church. Rather, they codified what believers had already come to accept and use as the word of God.

By the time the councils had approved the twenty-seven books of our New Testament, they had already served as the established companion to the Hebrew Scriptures for generations.

So, who decided what books should be in the Bible?

Ultimately, their Author.

The same Holy Spirit who inspired the biblical revelation (2 Peter 1:20-21) led the Christian movement to those books he inspired.

You can know that the Bible you hold today is the book God means you to have.

He did, in fact, hand it to man, through man—though the color of the cover is your choice.

Believing in God is the most fundamental aspect of Christianity. Bible Verses about Believing in God are listed to speak to our relationship with Him and how we can grow stronger through time.

They go beyond talking specifically about what it means for us as Christians to believe in Him. This article touches on 20 Biblical Verses that talk explicitly about Belief in God and why it’s so important to us as believers!

The Apostle Paul states, “Let no one deceive you in any way”. To be deceived is to be misled by something or someone. As a result of this, it frequently becomes difficult for the believer to sort out how he should react. It’s easy enough for a person not to believe that they have been deceived. The difficulty lies in determining how

Where in the Bible does it say only believe?

Foundationally, the Bible says in Hebrew 11:6. He that comes to God must believe that he is. This, Believing is the only requirement to participate in Christ’s Church, therefore believing is the only way in. As a result, believing is the one and only entry requirement. We must fully embrace God in all situations in order to experience genuine Christian living.

Believing in God but not Religion

The security of institutional religion may be obtained by confining Christianity to the performance of proper rituals, which is rather simple.

We go to church services, read the Bible, ask God for help, take Communion and sing in the choir. We also give our money away and even teach the Bible at times.

All of these factors are vital and must not be overlooked, but they are not all about Christianity. These tasks are pointless if Christ has not yet been enthroned in the heart of the individual.

The power of believing is one of the secrets of godliness, and it’s hidden in this basic truth: “Only Believe.” This brief phrase and order hold the key to Christian success. It demonstrates how easy and practical a successful Christian life maybe if properly understood.

Here are some Bible Verses about believing in God,

Hebrew 11 vs 6 – Rewards for Those believing in God.

Hebrew 11 vs 6 (ASV) – And without faith it is impossible to be well-pleasing unto him ; for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek after him.

This Scripture offers growing Christians advice on how to live as followers of Christ, which is characterized by faith.

While the first, easy step in pleasing God is to accept Christ’s saving work, it is a believer’s continuing, living faith that pleases God in the day-to-day conduct of life.

Only someone who believes in God may please him. We may please God at various stages of our lives, including when we are justified and as a sanctified life.

It is only because of Christ’s credited righteousness that we may please God, “without faith it is impossible to be well-pleasing unto him” However, once saved, we are to please Him by living by faith. We are to, once we have believed in Him, “believe that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.”

Once we have believed in God’s saving grace through faith in Christ, we must also believe that, as stated in Scripture, “he is a rewarder of them that seek after him.” When a sinner believes, there is joy in heaven, but we truly please Him when we live by faith.

1 Thessalonians 2:13 – The Word of God works Believers.

1 Thessalonians 2:13 (NASB) -For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of mere men, but as what it really is, the word of God, which also is at work in you who believe.

In this verse, Paul expresses his unending gratitude for the Thessalonian Christians’ faith, which resulted in their belief in God when he preached to them.

They accepted what he said as God’s Word, not man’s word. Paul recognized that God’s Word had taken root in their lives and was bearing spiritual fruit.

This comment expands on Paul’s remarks at the beginning of this letter when he also mentioned his “constant” mention of the Thessalonians in his prayers.

Acts 16:31 – Believe in The Son of God and Be Saved.

Acts 16:31 (NIV) – They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved–you and your household.”

In Acts of The Apostles, Following that, the city magistrates in Philippi beat and imprisoned Paul and Silas for telling the story of Jesus.

An earthquake released them and the other prisoners from their cells that night. They all stayed, preventing the jailer’s execution.

Now the two explain how Jesus offers sin forgiveness, saving the jailer and his family from an eternity in hell (Acts 16:20–30).

Believing in God through His Son Jesus is the only way to be saved. It’s not just about believing in God, but also of having faith and trust in Him (Ephesians 42:18–19).

Believing is critical to understand when it comes to accepting Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. Here are Bible Verses on Believing for salvation.

John 3:16 –  Believe in God and Have Eternal Life.

John 3:16 (ESV) – “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Christ was not sent to condemn the world, but rather to bring salvation. This is an example of God’s boundless love. Those who do not believe in Jesus Christ, on the other hand, are condemned by God.

Many people choose darkness rather than the Light when they could simply believe in God through Christ Jesus because of their inherent preference for evil.

Romans 15:13 – Joy and Peace in Believing.

Romans 15:13 (KJV) – Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.

Paul exhorts those who have been saved to be filled with “joy and peace in believing” or putting their faith in Jesus, according to Romans 15:33.

In other words, Paul is not appealing to God to simply fill their hearts with joy and serenity. He is asking that as these believers put their faith in God, their faith will bring them delight and serenity.

In other words, assist them in continuing to believe in order for them to experience joy and peace.

John 6:35 – Believe in God and Want No More

John 6:35 (NIV) – Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

People have come to Jesus in search of another miracle as well as more free food (John 6:26). Instead, Jesus advises people must seek the “real food from heaven” if they want to have eternal life. This does not correspond to excellent deeds, as Jesus has previously stated, but rather to believe in the One sent by God.

Here, Jesus states that He is the One who has been sent by God. Only by Believing in Jesus Christ can one find eternal life.

This is an appeal to everyone who hear to believe in Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God. Coming to Jesus entails making the decision to leave the world behind and follow Him.

Believing in Jesus is trusting that He is who He claims to be, that He will do what He promises, and that He is the only one who can.

John 20:31 –  Living by The Power in His Name.

John 20:31 (NLT) – But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing in him you will have life by the power of his name.

Believing in God and in the Power of His Name is a privilege given to every believer which is achieved and completed by believing in Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

Believing in Jesus makes a difference because Believers can enjoy eternal life through His unfailing promises while unbelievers.

The only requirement for everlasting life, as outlined in John’s Gospel’s purpose statement, is believing in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Nothing else is necessary.

If a person believes that believing in Jesus isn’t enough, he doesn’t believe the saving message.

Mark 11:24 – Answers to Your Prayers?

Mark 11:24 (AMB) – For this reason, I am telling you, whatever things you ask for in prayer [in accordance with God’s will], believe [with confident trust] that you have received them, and they will be given to you.

Believing that God will answer our request isn’t a spell we cast on Him to force Him to do what we want.

If we pray with the correct intentions as stated in James 4:1–3 and within God’s will (1 John 5:14–15), we will receive God’s ordained ministry.

“If any among you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who liberally gives to all without reproach, and it will be given him,” the Bible says (James 1:5).

We shall obtain what we ask for if we pray for discernment first and ask in God’s will. We won’t ask according to His will if we ask without discernment, and we have no reason to anticipate such a request to be granted.

“Believe that ye received them.” It is self-evident that such terms usually connote a prayer for spiritual rather than temporal blessings.

Subjective faith becomes an objective reality in the location. We are to believe that we will receive what we ask for right now, not somewhere in the far future.

In most, if not all, cases of prayer for peace, forgiveness, or illumination, the promise is psychologically accurate, even if it sounds exaggerated.

Isaiah 43:10 – The Fulfilment of Promises.

Isaiah 43:10 (NIV) – “You are my witnesses,” declares the LORD, “and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me.

Isaiah began his prophecy of hope and comfort in chapters 1-39, warning of impending punishment for unrepentant masses of nonbelievers and rewarding a faithful remnant with blessings of future prophecies. With deliverance and national restoration for those who believe, he continued into chapters 40-66, where he described the fulfillment of these promises.

God chose the nation of Israel as His witness to the entire world. They were to lead pagan civilizations into the fold of salvation by preaching the gospel to them.

They were supposed to be a source of enlightenment for non-Jews. They were intended to instruct people about God and warn them against the weakness of idols.

God never breaks His word, whether it is a promise of punishment for disobedience or a promise of blessing for loyalty. To rescue His people from their transgressions, God sent His Son into the world at the appointed moment.

John 5:24 –  They will be no condemnation.

John 5:24 (NLT) – “I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life

Jesus is condemned for violating Mosaic law regulations and claiming to be God’s equal after curing a man on the Sabbath.

In this passage, Jesus claims many of God the Father’s characteristics. Among them are God’s power, judgment, love, and majesty. According to Jesus, those who reject his message dishonor God, and only those who believe in him will be saved eternally.

The first step of believing in God is accepting His Son Jesus Christ and confessing that He is Lord and Savior.

Believing in God means we believe all the Bible teaches, especially about Jesus Christ as recorded in the New Testament which begins with four biographies of His life called Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Also believe the teachings about His Holy Spirit and thereby have a fruitful life through the power of that divine person who lives inside us.

 What does the Bible say about believing?

However, only the reality can set one free according to the Bible. Nobody is liberated until he has received the truth. It makes no difference how anyone feels about it.

With the heart, Romans 10:10 teaches us that man believes. This is something we must grasp. Believing is the basis of everything else. It’s all about believing with your heart.

Believing is a crucial component of every Christian experience. Jesus included it as part of the early “preaching of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God” in Mark 1:15 to underscore this point.

He says repent and “Believe the gospel”. And that is the message of the kingdom “Repent and Believe the gospel”. What you believe determines how you live.

Believing in God – Only Believe.

It’s no surprise why we see mediocrity and shallow Christianity in the world today. So many people have such a weak faith. This might be due to lack of knowledge in some instances, but it may also be due to the way the Gospel has been presented, which lacks the important deep understanding of the work of grace.

In other cases, efforts have been made to belittle or mock the divine principle “Only Believe.”

It may sound too easy to be true to some. The conclusion is that such persons “went about trying to establish their own righteousness, which they had no knowledge of.” Others believe that teaching on Grace might result in carefree Christians.

Believe in God’s Plan

Naturally, humans are concerned about how they appear outside and what they do in the physical. Obviously, this is what makes them accepted or rejected by others, at least initially. So they try to approach God same way where knowledge and revelation are lacking.

However, what a man is, he is from the inside. There is a popular saying that “You can’t tell a book by its cover. This applies to human beings also. You can’t tell a character by the “coverings”. What we really are, we are from the inside out. “As in water, face reflects face, so the heart of man reflects man” (Prov. 27:19) “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he (Prov. 23:7)“.

What does believing in God mean?

The word “heart” in the Bible refers to the “mind,” and it’s conceivable to appear attractive on the surface while being a filthy, polluted mess on the inside.Jesus revealed this in Matthew 23:27,28.

For you are like whited sepulchers, which appear lovely on the outside but are full of dead men’s bone and all uncleanness on the inside; similarly, you appear righteous on the outside but are full of hypocrisy and iniquity on the inside.”

This clearly characterizes the religion or life of a person who has not been born again, as there has been no change in his heart, and he instead struggles with morality but fails.

The goal of Bible passages regarding trusting in God is to demonstrate the simplicity of God’s act of grace in Christ, particularly in the areas of salvation, righteousness, eternal life, prayers, blessings, and miracles.

It will introduce every reader to Christ’s life and dispel any type of distraction or religion that may exist. Please join me on board. God will bring good out of your situation. You have to believe it.

Here are a list of Bible Verses about believing in God.

• Jeremiah 17:7-8
• John 7:38
• John 20:29
• John 1:12
• Romans 10:11
• Hebrews 11:1
• 2 Corinthians 4:18
• John 6:47
• Romans 10:9
• 1 John 3:23

See this Video on Bible Verses about Believing in God

DOWNLOAD FREE BIBLE WALLPAPER – BIBLE VERSES ABOUT BELIEVING IN GOD, FAITH, AND TRUST