The Fact about the Bible
You remember reading those old mystery books? Maybe your like me and as a little boy you loved the Hardy Boys. Maybe you never stooped that low, but insisted upon better quality books like Sherlock Holmes. Whatever the case you know how the stories go. There is a crime and a crime scene, and the detectives have to use certain methods and certain bits of sheer brain power to solve the case. Now how do they come to a conclusion as to what is true and what is false? Usually the process involves collecting evidence and then drawing conclusions based on that evidence.
Well, the same kind of Process applies to anything ancient and especially ancient documents. When a document is discovered steps must be taken to ascertain whether or not it has any historical or literary value. We have already seen the first two steps (here and here) that must be taken to this end. Now lets move to the third and most forensic test: the external test.
The external test has two parts to it: first it must check out with other documents as to whether or not it is true. Then it must be confirmed by archaeological findings. Most documents when put under this do fairly well, but they also often have cases of contradiction (however, they are not substantial enough to fail the document). The Bible on the other hand does not make any claims which are contradictory to solid archaeological or documentary evidence. Now it is quite impossible to exhaustively explain every single piece of evidence in support of the Bible, and whole books have been devoted to that end. Instead we will only look briefly at a few.
First of all, the very existence of Sodom and Gomorrah was for years considered by secularists to be a complete myth. It was further considered an even greater myth that as Genesis 19:24 reads: “The Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven.” However, to the utter astonishment of many the ruins Sodom and Gomorrah were found southeast of the Dead Sea and all over the sites are massive amounts of sulfur balls pointing toward some sort of massive hail storm of flaming sulfur. (I might add that some secularists claim that it was caused by a massive volcanic eruption somewhere else in the world, meaning that they were destroyed by natural phenomena, thus God had nothing to do with it. This is false reasoning because all it means is that God may have used natural means to accomplish a supernatural end.)
Another amazing testimony to the truthfulness of God’s word comes from historian and contemporary Flavius Josephus. Take a look at what he said regarding Christianity and the death (which many doubt) and resurrection (which even more doubt). And this comes from a man who persecuted and hated Christians:
At this time there was a wise man called Jesus, and his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. Many people among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. But those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive. Accordingly, he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have reported wonders. And the tribe of the Christians, so named after him, has not disappeared to this day.
If you would like to read more examples this website is very accurate, although it is quite brief: Faith Facts
