Scripture Part 1: Why Believe Scripture?

The foundation of everything at Michael's Abbey is scripture. But that begs the question, why should we believe scripture? To answer that has to come from outside scripture itself. You cannot use something to prove itself. It must be verified by something external to itself. To use something to prove itself is called circular reasoning. However, it is perfectly valid to check any source, including the Bible, against other sources. Then if it holds up to scrutiny we can judge it to be a reliable source. The more points of agreement the greater the confidence in the source, especially if we don't find disagreement in verifiable points.

The most common proof pastors like to use is all prophecies Jesus fulfilled. However, since they are speaking to Christian crowd who accepts the Bible as a valid source, most don't bother to give a reason to accept the biblical accounts and prophecies. Therefore they are using the Bible to prove the Bible, which is the very definition of circular reasoning. Thus their attempt at apologetics falls flat. Because they don't address why we should accept the Bible in the first place anyone who falls into doubt about scripture are not protected against false attacks on scripture. Not to mention pastors almost never address the criticisms against biblical prophecy.

Apologetics has nothing to do with the word apology. It is the logical and reasoned proof and defense of something. Apologetics in Christian theology is to use logic and reason to prove Christianity is true. Contrary to the common misconception, it is as much or more for believers than for the conversion of unbelievers. With unbelievers it only helps when they are honestly seeking the truth or are open to the possibility that Christianity is true. Those who have their minds made up will reject anything that contradicts their worldview no matter how correct and perfect it is. Their minds are closed to truth in favor of their prejudice. For believers apologetics is armor against attacks and the truth to defend against falsehood. Attacks will always come, especially when someone has doubts.

By directly addressing the criticisms of scriptural prophecy we provide a real apologetic of scripture. This will help Christians when they have doubts and aid them in finding the truth. One of the most common criticisms is the claim that the prophecies were written after the events they prophesied about, then faked that they were written earlier. However, even secular scholars agree the Dead Sea Scrolls, which include the Qumran texts, date as far back as 300 B.C. and were copies of older manuscripts. Thus we have archeological proof these prophecies about the Messiah predate Jesus' birth even non-Christians agree is true.

The next criticism is the claim that the gospel writers changed the story to match the prophecies, or that Jesus deliberately did things to fulfill them. However, we have written proof that is not the case. Writers at the time that were hostile to Christianity like Josephus document many of the events that fulfilled prophecy, including those Jesus had no control over such as where He was born and where He lived as a child, not to mention his death and resurrection. The empty tomb is verified by the Jewish leaders by their attempt to explain it. They were so against Jesus that they engineered His death, so they were absolutely not trying to help. That they did not even try to cover it up shows it was true.

There is a mountain of archeological evidence that supports the gospels as well as all of scripture. A recent example was a tablet discovered in Egypt that called God by the name Yahweh. For centuries people with a bias against scripture claimed the Exodus was a fairy tale. And they cited the lack of evidence, despite the convincing proof that the monuments were built by slave labor. However, since Egypt was humiliated by the escape by the Israelites carrying away tons of their gold and the destruction of the Egyptian army, it is no wonder they wanted to cover this humiliation. This attempt to cover it up continues today denying Israelites ever lived in Egypt. This required real archeologists to recover this artifact before it could be destroyed. This artifact proved that the Jews were in Egypt as the Egyptians didn't believe in God, let alone they never called God by the name Yahweh.

In trying to refute scripture some people will make false claims. These are almost always easy to see through to anyone who isn't completely ignorant on the subject. Unfortunately, ignorance is at an all-time high today because most people don't check what they hear, let alone who they hear it from. There is no excuse for the ignorance in the west today. We have greater access to real information than at any time in history. But instead of finding out for ourselves we listen to some goober on TV or social media with no checking them out in any way. As our schools are teaching fraudulent information, and have been for at least the last 50 years, they are teaching kids to just accept what they are told. If they taught critical thinking like schools did 150 years ago then the lies they are teaching would become obvious.

For example, when I moved to Japan I found every single thing I'd been taught about Japan in school and in the media in the 70's and 80's was completely false. School teachers and media with an agenda based on lies would show terraces of rice paddies cut into the side of hills and mountains and tell us this was because there was no land for farming. However, driving around Japan myself I found massive areas where there weren't even farms, let alone people. The majority of the country I saw was utterly unoccupied. The terraces of rice were used because they had been growing rice for thousands of years, which requires that paddies be alternately flooded and dry. But the water pump that could do this for them wasn't invented until 1851 by John Gwynne in Britain, and didn't come to Japanese agriculture until decades later. Thus the only easy way to control the water in rice paddies was to use sluice gates and gravity. When I asked a friend why they didn't buy land outside the city for a nice house and yard, he said it was because no one lives there. After going back and forth a few times due to the complete disconnect between our cultures, I finally understood. They didn't live in close quarters because there was no land. They did because that is the way they lived. And it made sense when for thousands of years safety meant living immediately next door to the samurai. I met one Japanese who did build where no one lived. He had lived in the US for almost 10 years going to school. So he saw a different way of life and understood that what he had grown up with was no longer necessary. When he moved back he bought a seaside patch of land for very little and built three houses on it. He couldn't get Japanese to rent the other two. But U.S. military stationed there were eager to rent homes with space and yards right by the sea. The schools and media in the U.S. made it all up, lied deliberately to support their agenda, or just arrogantly assumed they figured it out based on little evidence. Regardless of their motivation, they were teaching lies.

But it doesn't stop with schools and the old media. A great example of this in new media is some atheist YouTubers with a big following who try to say that prophecy in the Bible is provably false and cite the prophecy about Tyre in Ezekiel 26. A particularly lame Tuber stated that the Ezekiel 26 said the city of Tyre would be destroyed and flung into the sea, but it still exists today. However, that is as lame as traveling to Paris, Missouri and claiming the Eiffel Tower is a myth because it wasn't in the Paris they went to. The modern city called Tyre is not the same city. Secular historical documentation shows that it did happen exactly as Ezekiel prophesied. Previous attempts to conquer Tyre were thwarted as the people in the city of Tyre on the mainland would retreat to the island of Tyre and wait out conquerers. And there were repeated attacks by many nations just as Ezekiel prophesied, but they were unable to attack the island. A sea invasion would require skills most nations didn't posses, a huge navy no nation had at the time, and a massive army to be transported. Alexander the Great solved the problem. He sacked the city of Tyre, torn it down to the bare rock foundation as prophesied, and flung this debris into the sea making a land bridge to march his armies across and conquer these people. As the sea washed over the debris spreading it out, the former bridge became a shallow area good for fishing just like Ezekiel prophesied. Even today the evidence of the bridge is still there, with carved stones from the city of Tyre making up a large portion of this shallow area.

Take a few of the prophesies about Jesus, only the ones that He had no control over and hostile sources confirm actually happened. Then calculate the odds of all of them happening to one person by chance. The odds are so astronomical that even the analogies to relate to them are incomprehensible. Again and again, arrogant people who aren't a tenth as smart as they think they are come up with lame explanations or challenges to biblical prophesy. Any real research shows they didn't do their homework. In their arrogant hurry, they put too much stock in their own thoughts. Because they are wrong over and over on the things we can prove, they demonstrate they shouldn't be trusted on the things we can't prove. Thus listening to them is a waste of time.

It is because scripture is proven over and over by outside sources on the things we can verify that we can trust it on the things we can't verify. The mountain of evidence is greater than anything else in history. Therefore we can rely on scripture and shouldn't rely on anyone that contradicts it, whether they are old media, social media, or even someone who claims to be a Christian pastor.

If you are interested in going more in depth on the evidence for scripture I would recommend reading "The Case For Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus" by Lee Strobel and "Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels" by J. Warner Wallace.