>>Announcer: It has
stood the test of time....
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God's book, The Bible
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Still relevant in
today's complex world
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It Is Written
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Sharing messages of
hope around the world
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>>Chris: A Swedish couple was
visiting Italy. They were on a
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dream vacation and planned to
tour Italy. One of the sure
places that they wanted to see
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was the Blue Grotto sea
caves on the island of Capri.
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Unfortunately for the couple, as
they typed in the city to the
GPS, they typed in the city
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Carpi. There is such a city
in Italy and the GPS took them
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there. When they arrived and
asked about the sea caves - the
local tourist office informed
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them that they were 400 miles
or or about 640 kilometers off
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course. In fact, the GPS
couldn't have gotten them there
on land because Capri is an
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island. This couple ended up
in the wrong place because they
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were following
the wrong directions.
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Friends, I am afraid that we
are living at a time when many
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people may be following the
wrong directions in life. I
believe that the Bible is
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the only true road map and
guide. As you well know, the
title of this program
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is It Is Written. As I speak
from week to week, there is a
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very important assumption that I
make and that is that you
believe this book to be true and
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accurate - the word of God. It
is the most basic and
fundamental foundation
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that each Christian must have.
However, as many of us operate
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under a this very important
assumption. I wonder if many of
us take for granted that the
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Bible is the word of God and
what we find in it is true. Now
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before some of you leap to your
feet and disagree that you are
making an assumption, I
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would like for you to
contemplate very carefully
whether or not you have
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truly dealt with the concept of
the authenticity of the Bible.
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Many of us proclaim profound
truth, however I wonder if we
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have ever dealt with the
foundational principle of the
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reliability of the Bible. The
question is in reality, have you
placed your faith in something
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that is worthy? I must tell
you friends, as I have read and
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studied, my heart aches for
those who do not believe the
Bible Most alarming to me is the
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number of Christians who believe
only in portions of scripture or
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in none of it at all. In fact
there are many people today who
will ask the question,
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"You don't mean to tell me that
you really believe everything in
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the Bible do you?" The trends
are frightening: Since 1991
those who attend church on
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a weekly basis is less than 20%
of the population. Over the last
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20 years regular church
attendance has been on the
decline. 12% of born-again
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Christians do not believe the
Bible is totally accurate in all
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its teachings. 12% of all
Americans believe the name of
Noah's wife was Joan of
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Arc. Only 51% of American women
and 36% of American men believe
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that the Bible is totally
accurate in all its teachings.
In a recent survey 100 people
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were asked why people don't
believe the Bible. Here are the
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top 5 answers: 5 - Just a bunch
of stories 4 - Just written by
men 3 - I am my own source of
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truth and when I need answers to
my problems, I just go into my
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special room and cross my legs
and hum. 2 - Outdated and
irrelevant for today. We
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don't read old parenting manuals
or old auto repair manuals why
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should we read the Bible? 1 - It
is filled with contradictions I
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must tell you unequivocally that
none of these objections are
true I believe the Bible and I
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believe the evidence for it
being totally true is so
overwhelming, that most
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people when presented with
the information, will believe.
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First of all there is the
internal evidence. The Bible
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presents itself through several
texts that attest to the fact
that it is accurate and it will
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last forever. In Isaiah 40:8
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A clear testimony that it will
last on. Later in Isaiah 55:10,
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God's word will not return void.
It will do amazing things in the
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people who read it. The Bible
goes on to say in Psalm 119: 89
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In heaven there is no question
of the accuracy or truthfulness
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of God's Word. It is a settled
matter and I hope that over the
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course of the next few moments,
it will be settled in your mind.
In Matthew 5:18, the words
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of Jesus himself,
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The phrase jot or tittle is a
reference to the smallest Hebrew
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letter and the smallest vowel
marking. Here Jesus is telling
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us that God's Word has always
been and will always be the
same. And again Jesus speaks in
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Matthew 24:35
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Over the course of time, many
have tried to destroy this book,
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but none have been successful in
doing so. And finally in 2
Timothy 3:16 the Bible
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says,
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These words are just the words
of some random author, these are
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God's Holy and inspired words.
That word inspired literally
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means God breathed. It is
exciting to pick up and book and
know that these are God's
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very thoughts to us. We could go
on and on with many more texts
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of the Bible, but, friends, the
internal Biblical evidence
indicates that God's word
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is accurate and
will last forever.
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What about the outside evidence?
What about the external
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evidence, does it give credence
to the Biblical record? First
let's talk about the
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distribution of the Bible. It
has been translated completely
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into over 350 languages. It has
been partially translated into
over 2000 languages. There
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are people who have traveled to
the remotest parts of the world
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and learned the language of the
people for the sole purpose of
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having the Bible translated into
that language. The British Bible
society 30 years ago
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was printing 1 Bible every 3
seconds. That is 20 Bibles per
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minute. 1200 an hour and 28,800
per day. And that is just one
Bible society, and there are
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several other Bible societies.
In 201 Gideon's International
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gave out over 80 million copies
of the Bible. The Bible is the
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all-time best seller with over 6
Billion copies sold. Some might
say that's no big deal. Do
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you want to know what number
2 is? It is "Quotations from
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Chairman Mao Tse-Tung" with over
900 million copies sold Now when
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you get into the millions and
billions it is very hard to
fathom Let me break this down
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into more simple statistics.
The Bible sells 600 percent more
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than the number 2 book,
"Quotations from Chairman Mao
Tse-Tung". For every 6
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Bibles sold one person buys
"Quotations from Chairman Mao
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Tse-Tung." The Bible has
influenced more writing than any
other book. There has been
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more writing on the Biblical
topics of theology, hymnology,
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lexicons, dictionaries,
commentaries, and concordances
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than any other subject material.
Again, I could go on and on. But
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let's move on the fact that the
Bible has survived the test of
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time. First of all we must
consider the number of
manuscripts that exist.
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The Bible, when it was copied
long ago, was not copied with
00:11:07.86\00:11:12.33
copy machines or printing
presses like we have today.
Instead it was copied by hand.
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These hand written copies are
referred to as manuscripts. As
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archaeological digs progress
year after year, more and more
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manuscripts are found. Today we
have over 5,300 Greek
manuscripts of the New
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Testament, over 10,000 Latin and
9,300 early copies. That boasts
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to over 24,000 manuscripts. In
the area of ancient literature,
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let me tell you what that means:
the Bible dominates the scene
The Bible ranks first
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among all pieces of ancient
literature in the number of
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manuscripts. Just to give you an
idea, number two on the list is
authored by an ancient
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Greek poet by the name of Homer.
That book is entitled, "The
00:12:06.82\00:12:12.39
Iliad" with 647 manuscripts.
Just so we get the full picture,
the Bible stands at number
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one with 24,000 manuscripts. The
Iliad, which is number two on
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the list has 647manuscripts.
So powerful is this evidence for
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the authenticity of the Bible,
listen to what Sir Frederick
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Kenyon, former director and
principal librarian of the
British museum has to say,
00:12:38.82\00:12:45.16
Beyond just the sheer numbers
of manuscripts, let's talk about
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the agreement of these
manuscripts. Although we may
have a huge amount of
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manuscripts, if they all say
different things, then what's
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the point, right? New Testament
Greek scholar, Hort, estimates
that any substantial
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variation in the text is limited
to less than one-tenth of one
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percent of all manuscripts.
Let's just put a number to this:
of the 5300 ancient Greek
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manuscripts only 5 of them
have any substantial variations.
00:14:04.71\00:14:13.95
Friends the evidence is
clear this book can be trusted.
00:14:14.05\00:14:21.76
But what about the Old
Testament? To many Biblical
00:14:22.39\00:14:25.93
scholars this has been an area
of contention for many years.
The oldest manuscript that
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existed for many years was the
Masoretic Text, which dates to
00:14:33.74\00:14:42.51
900 A.D. Those who were the
greatest critics of the
authenticity of the Bible
00:14:42.61\00:14:46.18
used this as their foundation.
In fact their greatest attacks
00:14:46.28\00:14:50.39
were against the book of Isaiah,
especially chapter 53 that
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contains many of the prophecies
predicting Jesus as the coming
Messiah. These attackers
00:14:58.03\00:15:02.50
said that no one could have
written this before Jesus - they
00:15:02.60\00:15:07.24
said this because of its
accuracy, it must have been
written after the fact. Well,
00:15:07.34\00:15:13.07
one day all of this changed when
a young shepherd boy was
searching for a lost
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goat. As he walked along the
Dead Sea basin, he threw rocks
00:15:19.15\00:15:25.02
into the caves looking for that
goat. On one toss he heard a
loud crash. Upon investigating,
00:15:25.12\00:15:33.63
he discovered he had broken
a clay pot, which contained 7
00:15:33.73\00:15:42.80
scrolls in it. This discovery
lead to over a decade of
excavation and the finding
00:15:42.90\00:15:48.54
of over 40,000 manuscripts.
Many of which were of the Old
00:15:48.64\00:15:56.52
Testament and many of them were
of the book of Isaiah. They
dated to over a 1000 years
00:15:56.62\00:16:03.29
older than that of the Masoretic
text. Upon investigating the
00:16:03.39\00:16:09.46
Dead Sea Scrolls, listen to what
they found. In a comparison of
00:16:09.56\00:16:14.34
Is. 53 they found that there are
166 words contained in the text.
00:16:14.44\00:16:21.84
Of those 166 words the only
difference between the Masoretic
Text and the Dead Sea Scrolls
00:16:21.94\00:16:25.78
text is 17 letters and of
those 17 letters, 10 of them are
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common spelling differences, 4
were stylistic differences and
only3 letters changed the
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meaning of one word and that is
the word light - which does not
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alter the meaning of the text.
Do you realize what this means?
For over 1000 years
00:16:48.67\00:16:55.58
of handwritten copies the only
differences were of a stylistic
00:16:55.68\00:17:02.72
and spelling nature. This
demonstrates beyond a shadow of
a doubt that the Old Testament
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we have today is just as
it was when written by the Old
00:17:09.76\00:17:18.23
Testament writers. Again, let me
give you an idea of what this
all means in the study of
00:17:18.33\00:17:23.07
ancient literature. William
Shakespeare, you've all heard of
00:17:23.17\00:17:27.18
him, right? His works are from
the 1500's. In a study of the
00:17:27.28\00:17:33.38
manuscripts of Shakespeare, not
only are there manuscript
differences, they are
00:17:33.48\00:17:39.05
missing entire chapters of some
of his works. They can't find
00:17:39.15\00:17:43.96
them. They're gone. So these
beautiful plays, many times have
the modern directors own
00:17:44.06\00:17:50.10
adaptations and influences,
because there are entire
00:17:50.20\00:17:54.14
chapters of his works missing.
This is not true of any chapter
in the Bible. All are
00:17:54.24\00:18:01.44
authenticated and have
manuscripts to support their
00:18:01.54\00:18:08.88
text. Now, very briefly let's
talk about the timing of the
manuscripts. What we
00:18:09.85\00:18:14.06
are going to discuss is the
difference in time between the
00:18:14.16\00:18:17.36
event, the original writing, and
the oldest manuscript. Some of
what modern scholarship
00:18:17.46\00:18:24.87
considers to be the most
dependable ancient wirtings are
00:18:24.97\00:18:30.37
writings such as: Josephus'
Antiquities. This volume
recorded events that occurred
00:18:30.47\00:18:36.38
between 200 B.C. and 65 A.D. It
was written in 95 A.D. and the
00:18:36.48\00:18:46.12
earliest manuscript is from 1050
A.D. This is almost a 1000-year
00:18:46.22\00:18:54.60
difference in time between the
timing of the actual writing and
the oldest manuscript. Many
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other ancient works range from
a 700-1500 year difference. What
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about the Bible? In Matthew,
Mark, and Luke all have been
00:19:11.95\00:19:17.49
estimated to be written between
50 and 65 A.D. and there are
manuscripts that have been
00:19:17.59\00:19:24.86
dated to between 80 and 150 A.D.
Brothers and sisters, we are
00:19:24.96\00:19:33.13
talking about and
extraordinarily small span of
time. In the study of ancient
00:19:33.23\00:19:39.77
literature, this is absolutely
astounding. Friends, again
00:19:39.87\00:19:46.88
listen to Sir Frederick Kenyon
in his book, The Bible and
00:19:46.98\00:19:51.85
Archaeology, Archaeological
evidence is another
demonstration of the Bible's
00:20:24.15\00:20:28.06
reliability. One critique of
that Bible that many have argued
is that Moses could not have
00:20:28.16\00:20:35.46
written Genesis, Exodus,
Leviticus, and Deuteronomy
because the Hebrews had
00:20:35.56\00:20:41.90
not yet developed a
sophisticated alphabet at the
00:20:42.00\00:20:47.68
time. The critics argue that
Moses would have had to written
the books in hieroglyphics,
00:20:47.78\00:20:54.98
which in his life there would
not have been enough time to do
00:20:55.08\00:21:00.12
so. However, the discovery of
the Ebla Tablet and the Rosetta
Stone demonstrate that at
00:21:00.22\00:21:06.83
the time of Moses there was a
written language and a complex
00:21:06.93\00:21:16.00
legal system. And then there are
those who argue that the Bible
is full of contradictions,
00:21:17.64\00:21:22.84
friends, listen very carefully.
Many argue that the OT and NT
00:21:22.94\00:21:28.55
are not in agreement and are
contrary to one another.
However, accurate study will
00:21:28.65\00:21:33.76
demonstrate they are not
contrary, they are a continuing
00:21:33.86\00:21:39.73
development. There are stories
that may seem to be contrary to
one another, such as when
00:21:39.83\00:21:43.73
Jesus healed 2 blind men.
According to Mark and Luke it
was two men, but in
00:21:43.83\00:21:49.57
Matthew it only records one
blind man. Listen very
carefully, in order for a
00:21:49.67\00:21:55.64
contradiction to be a
contradiction it has to be that
00:21:55.74\00:22:02.15
2 things cannot be true at the
same time. Is that the case
here? Can they both be true at
00:22:02.25\00:22:08.76
the same time? Of course they
can, for some reason the one
00:22:08.86\00:22:14.36
blind man was more important
than the other to Matthew.
Friends, the Bible was written
00:22:14.46\00:22:19.07
over the course of 1500 years by
40 different authors, many of
whom didn't know one
00:22:19.17\00:22:25.74
another and they were from all
walks of life: kings, prophets,
00:22:25.84\00:22:31.45
fisherman, poets and shepherds.
Yet with such a great span of
time and diversity of
00:22:31.55\00:22:36.08
characters the Bible is in total
agreement. Here is the question
00:22:36.18\00:22:42.09
that I have had to ask myself.
In light of all this evidence do
I really utilize this
00:22:42.19\00:22:47.50
book as the unerring map of my
life? What excuse do I have? Is
00:22:47.60\00:22:55.37
it possible that we are in
danger of trusting man's word
over God's word? Is it possible
00:22:55.47\00:23:01.51
that we have degraded ourselves
from being "people of the Book"
00:23:01.61\00:23:06.85
to being simply
people of lip service.
00:23:06.95\00:23:10.69
In 1517, right in the center
of the Dark Ages - a time period
00:23:12.85\00:23:18.53
when the Bible was squashed
under foot - Martin Luther
exploded on the scene with
00:23:18.63\00:23:24.23
his 95 theses. The Reformation
was thrust forward at super
00:23:24.33\00:23:29.70
sonic speed. Men, women and
children were studying their
00:23:29.80\00:23:34.78
Bibles and rediscovering the
truths of the Word. One of the
00:23:34.88\00:23:40.42
places of greatest movement was
France, exploding with optimism
and hope as found in God's
00:23:40.52\00:23:46.19
word. But something happened,
under the influence of the pope
00:23:46.29\00:23:50.76
and bishops of the Roman
Catholic Church, the state
legislature authorized and
00:23:50.86\00:23:56.13
promoted the slaughter of
the protestant religion And on
00:23:56.23\00:24:03.37
August 24, 1572 commenced the
St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre.
00:24:03.47\00:24:08.61
One week later over 100,000
Christians had been slaughtered.
A mural still hangs in the
00:24:08.71\00:24:14.08
Vatican today celebrating
their victory. The French state
00:24:14.18\00:24:20.82
declared itself to be a state of
"reason." This denial of
Biblical truth would eventually
00:24:20.92\00:24:27.40
lead to the French Revolution
and the many who die at the
00:24:27.50\00:24:34.17
guillotine. Friends, the denial
of scripture only leads down one
road. And that is the
00:24:34.27\00:24:40.38
road of death and pain. We must
stand firm, and this must be our
00:24:40.48\00:24:49.85
textbook for living.
Jesus said in Matthew 24:35
00:24:49.95\00:24:54.09
This book will not die where
have you placed your faith, in
00:25:01.00\00:25:12.24
God's true word? The noted
French Infidel Voltaire died in
1778. He made it his life work
00:25:12.34\00:25:20.02
to eradicate Christianity and
just before he died he predicted
00:25:20.12\00:25:24.95
the within 100 years of his
death Christianity will be
extinct. But in one of the
00:25:25.05\00:25:30.99
greatest ironies of history,
within 50 years of his death,
00:25:31.09\00:25:37.13
the Geneva Bible Society
purchased his home and used his
own printing press to print
00:25:37.23\00:25:43.57
scores of
Bibles. Isaiah 40:8 says,
00:25:43.67\00:25:51.31
Will you stand with it? It will
stand forever. It is the map, it
00:26:00.96\00:26:06.29
is the guide - will you trust in
it? Today do you want to say to
Jesus, "I do trust Your
00:26:06.39\00:26:11.93
Word and I want to follow all of
its ways" If you do, why don't
00:26:12.03\00:26:18.01
you pray this prayer with me.
Heavenly Father, your word is
true. We know it to be
00:26:18.11\00:26:24.55
true and we want to follow
it. Please give us the strength,
00:26:24.65\00:26:29.72
give us the time to read it
every day, and may it be the map
of our life. We pray in Jesus'
00:26:29.82\00:26:36.19
name, amen.
00:26:36.29\00:26:38.03
The Bible is God's holy word.
It is reliable. It is authentic.
00:26:55.41\00:27:01.62
And it is a book that you can
trust. It is the roadmap for our
life. I'd like to offer
00:27:01.72\00:27:06.35
you today the Discover Bible
guides. These Discover Bible
00:27:06.45\00:27:11.39
guides will lead you in
understanding this roadmap, this
roadmap that leads to heaven
00:27:11.49\00:27:17.00
with Jesus. Here's the
information you need to receive
00:27:17.10\00:27:22.00
today's offer. God's holy book
is a book you can trust. I want
to encourage you to go to our
00:28:05.35\00:28:11.02
website, itiswrittencanada.ca,
and there you can find
00:28:11.12\00:28:13.12
resources to help you in
understanding this book and to
00:28:13.22\00:28:17.39
further your walk with Jesus. I
hope you enjoyed today's
program. I invite you to join us
00:28:17.49\00:28:22.93
next week. Until then, remember,
it is written, "Man shall not
00:28:23.03\00:28:28.77
live by bread alone, but by
every word that proceeds from
00:28:28.87\00:28:34.08
the mouth of God." $$$$$$$
00:28:36.01\00:28:37.81