Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 148, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 July 1918 — Why We Believe the Bible [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Why We Believe the Bible

By REV. W. W. KETCHUM

Director of Practice! Work Course, Moody Bible Institute. Chicago

It may be helpful to some who are wondering If the Bible is the Word of

God, if we state some reasons why Christian men and women believe the Bible. It is not a mark of learning, aa some would have us think, to disbelieve the Bible. Mr. Gladstone, England’s greatest state s m an, said, “It has been my privilege to know intimately sixty great men and all but six of them were earnest

acknowledged Christians.” Belief in the Bible is not a leap in the dark. It Is not attempting to believe it when we have no evidence whether it is true or not. Belief in the Bible rests upon evidence which to those who believe in the Bible is sufficient for them to accept it as the Word of God or man. I. One evidence upon which our belief in the Bible rests, is its own testimony. Believing it is unfair to judge it without hearing what it may have to say for itself we listen to its own testimony. One does not read far In the Bible before he comes to such statements as these: “Thus said the Lord,” or “The Lord said.” These phrases, or like ones, occur over five hundred times in the first five bocks of the Bible, and over twelve hundred times in the prophetical books. In addition to this we find that the men who wrote the Old and New Testaments claim their utterances to be divinely inspired. And the New Testament tells us that “holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Spirit of God,” and that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God," that is, God-breathed. Besides this, the book assumes to speak authoritatively from God to man. Now with this testimony before us, we are shut up to one of two conclusions; either it is what it claims to be, or it is a fraud. Having examined, studied and tested the book with the acid test of experience, we are persuaded that Its lofty claim Is established. 11. Another evidence which has led us to this conclusion and upon which we rest our belief is the unity. While it is a library of sixty-six books, it is nevertheless one single book and while it was written by about forty different writers, it has a singleness of plan and purpose. This in the face of the fact that its authors wrote over a period of something like fifteen hundred years. There is only one way to account for this unity and that is by believing that there was a great architectural mind that designed and executed his plan.

111. Again an evidence upon which we rest our belief in the Bible is its teaching. It is the one book that tells us about God; who he is and what he is; that tells us about man, whence he came, what he is, and whither he is going. It reveals the love of God in the plan and purpose of redemption through Christ. Without the Bible, we should by searching try to find out God and by guessing to discover ourselves. By it, we have come to know God, whom to know aright is life everlasting, and to know ourselves. What was said of our Lord can be said of the Bible: No book ever spake like this book. It is, indeed, a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path and shows us the way to that city whose builder and maker is God. IV. A fourth evidence upon which our belief rests is fulfilled prophecy. Take for Instance the prophecies concerning Christ of which there are, three hundred and thirty-three in the Old Testament All the prophecies concerning his first advent have mlnutely been fulfilled. These prophecies stand the severest tests, so that we know that we are not deceived as to their fulfillment so there was no possible way for the prophet to have known how they were coming out But they came out as predicted. This is only one of many lines of prophecy, which we would examine. Those concerning the Jews which led a court • preacher, when asked by his sovereign to prove the Scriptures, in one word to answer: “The Jews, your majesty, the Jews.” And the prophecies con-, ceming the great political systems of the world; such as Babylon, Medo-Per-sla, Greece, and Rome. Let anyone, who is in doubt about the Scriptures study the evidence of prophecy and he will find ground for faith in the Bible. V. Then finally, the evidence of what the Bible does is ground for our belief in it. By its fruits it can be judged. It has civilized nations, transformed the lives of millions, given hope to the hopeless, cheer to the downhearted, comfort to the sorrowing, consolation to the dying and taken ' hell out of life and put heaven in. What the Bible does gives us ground to believe it must be of God.