Jesus said this to His foes—the Pharisees:
You
search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these
are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you
may have life.
I
do not receive honor from men. But I know you, that you do not have the love of
God in you. I have come in My Father’s
name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, him you will
receive. How can you believe, who
receive honor from one another, and do not seek the honor that comes from the
only God? Do not think that I shall
accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you—Moses, in whom you trust.
For if you believed Moses, you would
believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But
if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words? (John 5:39-47 NKJV)
Those self-righteous, religious scholars boasted of
their comprehension and commitment to the Law of Moses—yet, they couldn’t see
the forest for the trees! They read the
Scriptures—and claimed to believe them—seeing them as a system of rules and
regulations to be enforced. They
overlooked that all the laws, ceremonies, sacrifices, prophecies, and so forth
pointed to the Messiah to come. Moses
wrote of Jesus and the redemption we need. Truly, there are rules and
principles laid out in Scripture, but this is not the core of what the Bible
is. The message is—we are broken because
of sin, helpless and hopeless to fix ourselves, but God in His grace and love
has provided us His Son to be our Savior.
We begin in Genesis with paradise lost, and everything that follows is
God’s love story, showing us how paradise can be restored, so reaching the last
book, Revelation, “It is done!”
(21:6).
After Christ rose from the dead, He made sure His
disciples got the message.
Then
He said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the
prophets have spoken! Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to
enter into His glory?” And beginning at
Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the
things concerning Himself. (Luke 24:25-27)
Like the Pharisees, we can stop our ears, shut our
eyes, and steel our hearts to the truth.
Please, consider carefully how logical it is to believe the Bible. Examine the evidence within and without the
Scriptures which witnesses to their accuracy and authority.
If you still wrestle with doubts, don’t despair! We see from these verses that even those
disciples had difficulty believing. Turning
to the Scriptures, however, and listening to the Spirit’s witness of Christ,
will yield faith in increasing measure. “And they said to
one another, ‘Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the
road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?’ ” (v.32)
Jesus knew this and so doubled down in His instruction
to His followers:
Then
He said to them, “These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still
with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of
Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms concerning Me.” And He opened their understanding, that they
might comprehend the Scriptures. (v.44-45)
The Bible is not just a book, but a library of 66
books. There are 40 authors writing from
3 continents, over a 2000 year span.
Yet, the message is a beautiful harmony—a symphony orchestrated by one Composer—sacred
History which is His story—with Christ, the central figure. That is miraculous! There is no reasonable explanation for such unless
there was an omniscient Author guiding the words penned by the human authors. Examine the truth and embrace it to the
saving of your soul and sustenance of your spiritual life.
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