The Nugget:
1Pe 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: (KJV)
1Pe 3:15 But give honour to Christ in your hearts as your Lord; and be ready at any time when you are questioned about the hope which is in you, to give an answer in the fear of the Lord and without pride; (Basic English Bible)
My Comment:
Reading this verse ought to encourage us to become better prepared to answer the questions others will have about our faith in God and the Bible.
In my own circle of friends and acquaintances, and perhaps in your own circle, not many are atheists or agnostics or just simply nonbelievers. But sincere and sometimes very committed people are “out there” who do not share our faith in God and the Bible. I find they are very prominent on Internet sites that happen to present an article that pertains to religious faith or the lack of it.
I visited the Pew Research site again today and found the following response to a sincere Christian’s prior appropriate comment on the issues being discussed there:
[the only question that matters in the end is “what have you done with my Son?” He came to forgive (take punishment) for sins]
And..
[I undertand people leaving religion, but within the Bible shows why the world is in its mess and the solution for the individual. ]You’re making the mistake of assuming there’s any validity to the bible. All your points are based on you concluding that the bible has merit.
The question you should be asking yourself is why you think the bible has any more truth to it, than all the other religions.
Why does what your family believe, and your place of birth determine what religious beliefs you happen to hold.
Is this the real way that truth works? Imagine if we had Indian geology and Chinese physics, and middle eastern chemistry. We’d rightly laugh and say that the truth doesn’t work that way.
But this is exactly what we see when it comes to religion. If you live in Iran, you’re probably a shiite Muslim. If you live in Pakistan, you’re very likely to be a Sunni Muslim. If you live in the US, you’re likely to be a Christian, a protestant Christian in the south, a Catholic Christian in the north. If you live in India, you’re probably an Hindu. If your parents are Jewish, you’re probably Jewish. If they’re Sikh, you’re probably a Sikh.
Notice the pattern?
Note that right from the start, the Christian is challenged by the non-Christian’s comment:
You’re making the mistake of assuming there’s any validity to the bible. All your points are based on you concluding that the bible has merit.
The question you should be asking yourself is why you think the bible has any more truth to it, than all the other religions.
That is the question those of us who are Bible-believing Christians need to be able to answer. It is my hope that the church you attend is a Bible-believing, Bible-teaching church that teaches the answer to this challenge. This is what the subject of apologetics is about. Well, if your church, your pastor, your youth group leader or sponsor, your Sunday school teacher is not teaching you about this, you can learn about it here by reading what I post, and by posting your own questions you want answered in the comment section below.
Is there any validity to the Bible? Does the Bible merit our belief?
You can be very sure that the Bible has validity and it merits our belief.
To support this claim, I invite you to consider that (1) there are internal evidences that demonstrate the truth of the Bible. These include (a) the internal consistency of the Bible, a Book, which is a collection of 66 books, written by approximately 40 different authors over a period of more than 1500 years, as I recall. No other collection of religious writings written over a similar span of time can be collected which demonstrates the kind of internal consistency or internal unity found in the Bible. This internal consistency is seen by the fact that there are no provable contradictions in the Bible. The unity of the Bible is seen when we consider that it is possible to profitably study the Bible by means of cross reference Bible study, a kind of Bible study you may not have ever done yourself, but I invite you to do so by getting and learning to use my new Bible software program titled The Ultimate Cross Reference Treasury.
Another internal evidence that demonstrates the truth and validity of the Bible is the (b) internal evidence of its historicity. This is seen in the claim of its writers to eye-witness authority (see Luke 1:1, 2, 3, 4; Luke 3:1, 2; John 19:35; Acts 2:22; Acts 26:24, 25, 26; 1 John 1:1, 2, 3; 2 Peter 1:16).
This is seen and proven by what are called un-designed coincidences. The reality of the business and concerns reported in the New Testament give evidence, upon careful reading of the documents themselves, that they refer to real people engaged in real concerns which are not the mere invention of a fiction writer or the inventor of a forgery. See my note at Acts 12:12 in The New Treasury of Scripture Knowledge or The Ultimate Cross Reference Treasury for the full evidence.
As you might imagine, much more can be said or written in defense of the validity of the Bible, but at just over 850 words, this might be enough to whet the appetite for more on the part of any person who really wants to explore, learn, and know the truth about the Bible.