PROOF OF THE BIBLE: THE RESURRECTION

Jesus had the highest possible regard for Scripture. According to Him, it was entirely the Word of God. Not the slightest marking of Scripture had been misplaced (Matthew 5:17-18).

However, why should we accept His testimony? Perhaps He was in error or even deluded? However, if He is God-incarnate, then we can trust His testimony. But was He? Can we just take His word for it?

Jesus had instructed us to not believe in His words unless there was also evidence to conform them:

·       “If I am not doing the works [miracles] of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” (John 10:37-38; ESV; also John 5:31-38)

His entire ministry was bathed in the most incredible miracles. But the miracle that confirmed His words and the Words of the Hebrew Scriptures, was the Resurrection. If Jesus rose from the dead, as He said that He would, this unique event also confirms His other words, namely, His teachings about the divinity of the Scriptures.

Actually, the proof that He had risen from the dead is quite impressive. In the Resurrection of the Son of God (2003), N.T. Wright, the Bishop of Durham, England wrote:

·       The proposal that Jesus was bodily raised from the dead possesses unrivaled power to explain the historical data at the heart of early Christianity.

It is the evidence that gives this claim “unrivaled power." Here is how I hope to lay out the evidence:

1.    Jesus was crucified.

2.    His tomb was empty and no one was able to produce His body.

3.    Many eyewitnesses testified that He had risen.

4.    The circumstantial evidence also confirms His Resurrection.

5.    No other theory has been able to account for these facts.

1.       Jesus was crucified.

Even Biblical skeptics have called this an “indisputable fact”:

·       NT scholar, John Dominic Crossan: “That He was crucified is as sure as anything historical ever can be.” (Lee Strobel, The Case for the Real Jesus, 2007; 113)

·       “Both Gerd Ludemann, an atheistic NT critic, and Bart Ehrman, who’s an agnostic, call the crucifixion an indisputable fact.” (113)

·       Tacitus, Roman historian, 110 AD: “Jesus suffered the extreme penalty under the reign of Tiberius.” (113)

·       “Josephus [the Jewish historian, 90 AD] reports that Pilate ‘condemned him to be crucified’…Even the Jewish Talmud reports that ‘Yeshu was hanged.’” (113)

·       Apologist Michael Licona claims that “Lucian of Samosata, who was a Greek satirist, mentions the crucifixion, and Mara Bar-Serapion, who was a pagan, confirms Jesus was executed.” (113)

Even the skeptics endorse the fact that Jesus died on the cross:

·       The crucifixion of Jesus is recognized even by the Jesus Seminar as "one indisputable fact.” http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/rediscover2.html#text17

Michael Licona claims that “The scholarly consensus—again, even among those who are skeptical about the resurrection – is absolutely overwhelming.” Nevertheless, six hundred years after the event, the Koran claimed that a look-alike died in Jesus’ place, “and Allah raised him [Jesus] up to Himself.” However, this assertion does not rest upon any historical evidence.

2.       Jesus’ tomb was empty, and no one was able to produce His body.

Had Jesus’ body been produced, any claim of a resurrection would have easily been dismissed.  

All early reports, even Jewish, cited an “empty tomb”! However, there are no reports of anyone producing His body, although the Jews and Romans had every reason to produce it. Had it been produced, Christians wouldn’t have been able to believe in a resurrected Christ.

Instead, to guard against the possibility that Jesus’ disciples might say that He rose from the dead, the Jewish leadership prevailed upon Pilate to provide a Roman guard at Jesus’ tomb. However, even with the guard, the chief priests claimed that the disciples stole the body:

·       “Now while they were going, behold, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all the things that had happened. When they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers, saying, "Tell them, 'His disciples came at night and stole Him away while we slept.' And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will appease him and make you secure." So they took the money and did as they were instructed; and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.” (Matthew 28:11-15)

Even Justin Martyr (150 AD) wrote in his “Dialogue with Trypho” that the Jews still sent ambassadors throughout the Mediterranean, claiming that the “Disciples stole the body.” However, this doesn’t seem to be possible for a number of reasons:

·       The disciples had been running scared prior to the Resurrection. They wouldn’t have risked their lives on a dangerous prank.

·       They would never have died as martyrs for a story that they had cooked up. Besides, as mentioned above, there is no indication from the Gospels themselves that this was all part of a subterfuge. Their accounts that women were the first to see the risen Christ also argues against this.

·       They had no motive to do this and to risk martyrdom themselves.

·       They could not have stolen away the body with the presence of the Roman guard.

Willian Lane Craig reasons that the empty tomb could not have been a legend:

·       "If the empty tomb story were a legend, then it is most likely that the male disciples would have been made the first to discover the empty tomb. The fact that despised women, whose testimony was deemed worthless, were the chief witnesses to the fact of the empty tomb can only be plausibly explained if, like it or not, they actually were the discoverers of the empty tomb." http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/historical-evidence-for-the-resurrection

The testimony of women had been disregarded in Jewish culture at this time. For example, the Jewish historian Josephus (90 AD) wrote:

·       “But let not the testimony of women be admitted, on account of the levity and boldness of their sex.” (Strobel, 124)

According to Lee Strobel, Gary “Habermas determined that about 75% [of historians] on the subject [of the empty tomb] regard it as an historical fact.” He adds, “All the strictly historical evidence we have is in favor [of the empty tomb], and those scholars who reject it ought to recognize that they do so on some other ground than that of scientific history” (Strobel, 123).

D.H. Van Daalen had confirmed this assessment:

·       "It is extremely difficult to object to the empty tomb on historical grounds; those who deny it do so on the basis of theological or philosophical assumptions." (D. H. Van Daalen, The Real Resurrection (London: Collins, 1972), p. 41)

Jacob Kremer, who has specialized in the study of the resurrection and is a NT critic, had said:

·       "By far most exegetes hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements about the empty tomb" and he lists twenty-eight scholars to back up his fantastic claim. http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/historical-evidence-for-the-resurrection

The Early Church worshipped on the Sunday – the Resurrection Day – rather than on the Jewish Sabbath (Saturday). Evidently, they were convinced that Jesus’ tomb was empty and that He rose on the Sunday. How else to explain the change from the Sabbath day!

3.       Many eyewitnesses testified that He had risen.

The Disciples believed that Jesus had appeared to them. Their assertions about this event are quite numerous and credible:

·       This is the uniform testimony of all 27 books of the New Testament! Licona states that, “Even very liberal scholars will concede that we have four biographies [Gospels] written within 70 years of Jesus’ life that unambiguously report the disciples’ claims that Jesus rose from the dead.” (Lee Strobel, “Finding the Real Jesus,” 83)

·       Preserved oral tradition is also in agreement. According to Licona, the NT “preserves several sermons of the apostles…We can say that the vast majority of historians believe that the early apostolic teachings are enshrined in these sermons summaries in Acts – and they declare that Jesus rose bodily from the dead.”

This is also the uniform testimony of all the Church Fathers. For example, Clement (95 AD) wrote:

·       “Therefore, having received orders and complete certainty caused by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ and believing in the Word of God, they went with the Holy Spirit’s certainty.” (1 Clement 42:3)

The Church Father Polycarp (110 AD) wrote:

·       “For they did not love the present age, but Him who died for our benefit and for our sake was raised by God.” (Polycarp’s Letter to the Philippians 9:2)

It’s apparent that Christians have practiced baptism and communion from the very inception of the Church. These rituals testify to the fact that they acknowledged the death and Resurrection of Christ.

There are several things that make the Apostolic testimonies of the Resurrection highly credible:

·       Some of the Church Fathers, whose writings we still retain, knew the Apostles of Jesus. Many were also martyred for their insistence that Jesus rose.

·       The Apostles “were willing to endure persecution and even martyrdom….The church fathers Clement, Polycarp, Ignatius, Tertullian, and Origen – they all confirm this. In fact, at least seven early sources testify that the disciples willingly suffered in defense of their beliefs – and if we include the martyrdoms of Paul and Jesus’ half-brother James, we have eleven sources” (Licona, 85). They wouldn’t have suffered for their testimony of the Resurrection unless they were convinced that it had actually happened.

·       The Apostles presented themselves in a very unfavorable light in the NT writings. They must have been convinced of a greater and surpassing truth – the Resurrection – to have made themselves look so ridiculous. If their testimony of the Resurrection had merely been fabrication, they would have had every reason to present a winsome self-image to the world.

·       Their writings emerge with flying colors when examined culturally, critically and historically.

·       Jesus appeared to His disciples over a 40 day period following His Resurrection. Paul reports that on one occasion, He appeared to over 500 at one time: “He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.” (1 Cor. 15:5-8). Paul is suggesting, only about 20 years after the Resurrection that his readers could verify, through these eyewitnesses, whether these events really took place. Had they not taken place as Paul had reported, he would have been dismissed.

·       Jesus’ Apostles weren’t reporting about an event that had taken place in China, but in Jerusalem, where their testimonies could easily have been discredited. There certainly were enough people trying to do so.

·       The Gospel accounts record that two members of the Sanhedrin had taken the body of Jesus and buried it. This could have easily been contradicted if it hadn’t taken place. Likewise, many supernatural events accompanied the accounts of the Crucifixion – appearances by dead saints, darkness upon the land for three hours, the rending of the Temple veil, and an earthquake. Had these events not taken place, the Gospel accounts could easily have been falsified by the Jerusalem establishment, situated as they were in the very location of these events.

·       The Gospels report that women were the first to testify of the Resurrection. However, no one would have fabricated such an account, because the testimony of women was disdained. Furthermore, Mary Magdalene seems to have been the first to report the Resurrection. However she had an additional onus upon her. She had been regarded as a sinner. The Apostles would never have fabricated such accounts.

·       There is no record of the disciples ever recanting, even under torture. If this had ever happened, such a record would surely have been preserved.

Licona reports that Gary Habermas had consulted over 2,000 scholarly sources on the Resurrection and concluded with Habermas that “probably no fact was more widely recognized than that the early Christian believers had real experiences that they thought were appearances of the risen Jesus.” (86). For instance:

·       Even the atheist [Gerd] Ludemann conceded: ‘It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.’” (Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus?, trans. John Bowden (Louisville, Kent.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), p. 80.)

The liberal Jewish historian, Paula Fredriksen, claims

·       “The Disciples’ conviction that they had seen the risen Christ…is historical bedrock, facts known past doubting.” (Strobel, 119)

·       “I know in their own terms what they saw was the raised Jesus. That’s what they say and then all the historic evidence was have afterwards attests to their conviction that that’s what they saw. I’m not saying that they really did see the raised Jesus. I wasn’t there. I don’t know what they saw. But I do know that as a historian that they must have seen something.” (119)

However, as non-believers, they are more inclined to ascribe the disciples’ sincere accounts of the Resurrection to hallucinations or visions. If so, they all experienced the very same hallucination during the 40 days of Jesus’ appearances – 500 at one time – even hallucinations that included eating and talking with Jesus, and even touching Him! Paul reported:

·       For I delivered [this early report) to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. (1 Corinthians 15:3-8)

Paul wrote (55-57 AD) that on one occasion, Jesus had appeared to “more than five hundred…most of whom are still alive.” This leads to three conclusions:

1.    It would have been hard to get away with such a statement had it not been true.

2.    These people were still available to confirm Jesus’ post-Resurrection appearances – something that would require confirmation.

3.    Jesus must have risen. How else could the faith of unbelievers, like James and Paul, be explained, especially after the crucifixion!

NT scholar James Dunn is emphatic that Jesus’ disciple had been convinced that Jesus had risen:

·       “It is an undoubted fact that the conviction that God had raised Jesus from the dead and had exalted Jesus to his right hand, transformed Jesus’ first disciples and their beliefs about Jesus.” (Christian Research Journal, Vol.39, No.2, 14)

Christian Apologist Michael Licona adds:

·       “After Jesus’ death, the disciples endured persecution, and a number of them experienced martyrdom. The strength of their conviction indicates that they were not just claiming Jesus had appeared to them after rising from the dead. They really believed it. They willingly endangered themselves by publicly proclaiming the risen Christ.” (CRJ,16)

So too Christian Apologist Sean McDowell:

·       “From the Apostles forward, there is no evidence for an early Christian community that did not have belief in the Resurrection at its core. The centrality of the Resurrection can be seen by considering the earliest Christian creeds, the preaching in Acts, and the writings of the apostolic fathers.” (CRJ,14)

4.       The circumstantial evidence also confirms His Resurrection.

EVIDENCE OF CONVERSIONS: The Apostle Paul had been the leading persecutor of the Church, leading lynching parties against them. However, he reports that he had had an encounter with Christ which blinded him. He was them miraculously healed and subsequently had other encounters with Christ. Had he not been convinced that Jesus had risen, there would have been no conversion. Licona concludes, “He had nothing to gain in the world – except his own suffering and martyrdom – for making this up.”

Initially, Jesus’ family had thought that “He is out of his mind” (Mark 3:21; John 7:3-5). This assessment would have been reinforced by the Crucifixion. However, James and Jude became believers. Had the Resurrection not taken place, it is hard to conceive how this transformation could have taken place.

Without the Resurrection, it is inconceivable that multitudes would have sacrificed everything for a disgraced “Messiah” who had been shamefully crucified. The Book of Acts reports that even after Peter had preached his initial sermon, 3000 came to believe (Acts 2:41). Had there not been substantial evidence for the Resurrection, this could not have happened. No one would have risked persecution for a disgraced would-be Messiah.

The Gospels show us that, following the Crucifixion, the disciples had fled and abandoned their faith. Only the Resurrection could have convinced them that they had a future with Jesus and given them the boldness to stand against persecution.

Only the Resurrection could account for the growth of the Church. Had there been no Resurrection, only scorn and ridicule would accompany anyone who continued to believe in someone humiliated and crucified.

Dr. Simon Greenleaf, founder of the Harvard Law School, notes:

·       "Propagating this new faith, even in the most inoffensive and peaceful manner, [early Christians received] contempt, opposition… and cruel deaths. Yet this faith they zealously did propagate, and all these miseries they endured undismayed, nay rejoicing. As one after another was put to a miserable death, the survivors only [continued] their work with increased vigor and resolution… The annals of military warfare afford scarcely an example of like heroic constancy, patience, and unblenching courage… If it were morally possible for them to have been deceived in this matter, every human motive operated to lead them to discover and avow their error. From these [considerations] there is no escape but in the perfect conviction and admission that they were good men, testifying to that which they had carefully observed…and well knew to be true. http://christiananswers.net/q-eden/edn-t012.html

5.       No other theory has been able to account for these facts.

There have been many attempts to humanly explain the empty tomb. However, these have all failed. Philosopher and apologist William Lane Craig wrote:

·       C. F. D. Moule of Cambridge University concludes that we have here a belief which nothing in terms of prior historical influences can account for--apart from the resurrection itself. www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/rediscover2.html#text17

·       Any responsible historian, then, who seeks to give an account of the matter, must deal with these four independently established facts: the honorable burial of Jesus, the discovery of his empty tomb, his appearances alive after his death, and the very origin of the disciples’ belief in his resurrection and, hence, of Christianity itself. I want to emphasize that these four facts represent, not the conclusions of conservative scholars, nor have I quoted conservative scholars, but represent rather the majority view of New Testament scholarship today. The question is: how do you best explain these facts?

Craig concludes that all of the naturalistic theories have now been rejected by modern scholarship. This leaves the Resurrection as the only contender:

·       In fact, the evidence is so powerful that one of today’s leading Jewish theologians Pinchas Lapide has declared himself convinced on the basis of the evidence that the God of Israel raised Jesus from the dead!

If Jesus rose from the dead, then this validates what He had said about Himself and about the Scriptures – that they could not be broken (John 10:35). His Resurrection also validated what He said about His own words:

·       “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love… You are my friends if you do what I command you.” (John 15:10, 14)

·       Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. (Matthew 24:35)

THE BIBLE AS GOD’S VERY WORDS: EXTERNAL VERIFICATIONS

 Is the Bible’s reliability and historicity supported by evidence external to the Bible? This is a huge question, which calls upon every area of human inquiry to pass judgment. Do the fields of history, archeology, geology, psychology, linguistics, astronomy, sociology, and physics validate or invalidate the biblical accounts? For example, New Testament scholars, historians, and archeologists give high grades to the New Testament Greek text. Based upon the textual evidence, even the agnostic and New Testament Critic, Bart Ehrman confessed:

·       The oldest and best sources we have for knowing about the life of Jesus…are the four Gospels of the NT…This is not simply the view of Christian historians who have a high opinion of the NT and in its historical worth; it is the view of all serious historians of antiquity…it is the conclusion that has been reached by every one of the hundreds (thousands, even) of scholars. (Truth and Fiction in the DaVinci Code, 102)

Ehrman, who likes to impugn the many NT texts, had been asked:

·       Bruce Metzger [the leading textual credit of his day] your mentor in textual criticism to whom this book [“Misquoting Jesus”] is dedicated, has said that there is nothing in these variants of Scripture that challenges any essential Christian beliefs…Why do you believe these core tenants of Christian orthodoxy to be in jeopardy based on the scribal errors you discovered in the biblical manuscripts? (Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus)

Ehrman answered:

·       Even though we may disagree on important religious questions – he is a formly committed Christian and I am not – we are in complete agreement on a number of very important historical and textual questions. If he and I were put in a room and asked to hammer out a consensus statement on what we think the original text of the New Testament probably looked like, there would be very few points of disagreement…The position I argue for in Misquoting Jesus does not actually stand at odds with Prof. Metzger’s position that the essential Christian beliefs are not affected by the textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament. (252)

Metzger had claimed the text of the NT to be “99.5 free from textual discrepancies.” Ehrman, ordinarily the strongest dissenting voice, also admitted:

·       The more manuscripts one discovers, the more the variant readings; but also the more the likelihood that somewhere among those variants readings one will be able to uncover the original text. Therefore, the thirty thousand variants uncovered by [critic John] Mill do not detract from the integrity of the New Testament; they simply provide the data scholars need to work on to establish the text, a text that is more amply documented than any other in the ancient world. (87)

There is a strong consensus among NT textual critics that from the almost 6,000 ancient Greek manuscripts and fragments, the original text can be very closely approximated. In Misquoting Truth, Timothy Paul Jones adds:

·       Sir Frederic Kenyon, former director of the British Museum, once commented concerning the Gospels, “The interval between the dates of the original compositions and the earliest extant [existenting manuscripts] evidence [is] so small as to be negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed.” (50)

NT scholar William Warren concurs:

• I would say that our [present composite NT] text almost certainly represents a form that is almost identical to the original documents. (Bart Ehrman and Daniel Wallace in Dialogue: The Reliability of the NT, 122)

Another NT scholar, Craig Evans, affirms the same thing:

• Given the evidence, we have every reason to have confidence in the text of Scripture. This does not mean that we possess 100% certainty that we have the exact wording in every case, but we have good reason to believe that what we have preserved in the several hundred manuscripts of the first millennium is the text that the writers of Scripture penned.

Similarly, NT textual critic Silvie Raquel writes:

• I also have studied New Testament textual criticism and, by contrast with Ehrman, have found confirmation about the validity of the text…by defective reasoning, misuse of the evidence, and a misconception of inerrancy, Ehrman fails to build a case for the unreliability of the New Testament text as a sacred and inspired text. (173, 185)

Daniel Wallace concluded:

·       “On the contrary, it [scholarship] has built it [my faith]. I’ve asked questions all my life, I’ve dug into the text, I’ve studied this thoroughly, and today I know with confidence that my trust in Jesus has been well placed…very well placed.”

The leading NT textual critic of his day, the late Bruce Metzger, concluded:

·       “The modern NT is 99.5% free from textual discrepancies, with no major Christian doctrines in doubt.”

Greek scholar D.A. Carson sums up the evidence this way:

·       "The purity of text is of such a substantial nature that nothing we believe to be true, and nothing we are commanded to do, is in any way jeopardized by the variants."

And what about the historical accuracy of the Gospels? About Luke, New Testament scholar, F.F.Bruce, has written:

·       “A man whose accuracy can be demonstrated in matters where we are able to test it is likely to be accurate even where means of testing aren’t available. Accuracy is a habit of mind…Luke’s record entitles him to be regarded as a writer of habitual accuracy.”

Archeologist John McRay adds:

·       “One prominent archeologist carefully examined Luke’s references to 32 countries, 54 cities, and 9 Islands w/o finding a single mistake.” (Lee Strobel,  Case For Christ)

About the Gospel of John, McRay claims:

·       “It [the Pool of Bethesda] lies maybe 40 feet below ground – and sure enough, there are five porticoes…exactly as John had described. And you have other discoveries – the Pool of Siloam from John 9:7, Jacob’s Well from John 4:12, the probable location of the Stone Pavement near the Jaffa gate where Jesus appeared before Pontius Pilate in John 19:13, even Pilate’s own identity – all of which have lent credibility to John’s Gospel.” (Strobel)

·       “Archeology has not produced anything that is unequivocally a contradiction to the Bible. On the contrary, as we’ve seen, there have been many opinions of skeptical scholars that have become codified into ‘fact’ over the years, but that archeology has shown to be wrong.”

In fact, the textual evidence along with other forms of historical evidence are so compelling that even skeptics acknowledge that the Apostles had been convinced that they had encountered the resurrected Jesus.

Even the atheist Ludemann had conceded:

·        “It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.” (Strobel)

Jewish NT scholor Paula Fredriksen also conceded:

·       “The Disciples’ conviction that they had seen the risen Christ…is historical bedrock, facts known past doubting.” (Strobel)

NT scholar James Dunn went a step further:

·       “It is an undoubted fact that the conviction that God had raised Jesus from the dead and had exalted Jesus to his right hand transformed Jesus’ first disciples and their beliefs about Jesus.” (Christian Research Journal, Vol.39, No.2, 14)

Christian Apologist Michael Licona adds:

·       “After Jesus’ death, the disciples endured persecution, and a number of them experienced martyrdom. The strength of their conviction indicates that they were not just claiming Jesus had appeared to them after rising from the dead. They really believed it. They willingly endangered themselves by publicly proclaiming the risen Christ.” (16)

So too Christian Apologist Sean McDowell:

·       “From the Apostles forward, there is no evidence for an early Christian community that did not have belief in the Resurrection at its core. The centrality of the Resurrection can be seen by considering the earliest Christian creeds, the preaching in Acts, and the writings of the apostolic fathers.” (14)

All the above represent affirmations of the Christian faith based historical and textual evidences. However, there are many other forms of external confirmations.

         

Scientific Confirmations

Theistic evolutionists (TEs) discount the role of science and physical evidences in supporting the Christian faith. Why? For one thing, they claim that the Bible is not about the physical world and science is not about the spiritual world. Therefore, there is no basis for any conflict between these two world as they occupy very different worlds. Therefore, if this artificial and unsupportable distinction is held, the TE claims that the Christian can also be an evolutionist.

·       “The science of the Bible is obviously the ‘science’ of the ancient near east, and is antiquated and therefore wrong. Instead, the Bible is about salvation [the spiritual world] and a relationship with Christ.”

This dogmatic statement dismisses whatever the Bible teaches about the physical world, including history, geography, psychology and biology. Why then not also dismiss what the Bible has to say about our feelings, thought life and spiritual growth? These, of course, are connected to our biology (our physical life) – eating, sleeping, and drinking. Clearly, these two worlds are inseparable.

Besides, I don’t see how we can trust in the Bible’s spiritual message once we deny its physical message.

The TEs distinction between the Bible’s teachings about the physical world and the spiritual cannot hold up under scrutiny. The Bible states that Lazarus rose from the dead, but all miracles impinge upon the physical world. Is the Bible then wrong in its account of miracles?

Instead, the biblical worldview will not allow us to separate its historical teachings from its spiritual teachings. Its spiritual teaching of forgiveness and new life through the death and resurrection of Jesus is inseparable from its physical teaching that Jesus historically died on the cross for us.

Nevertheless, TEs try to separate the two aspects of scriptural teaching – the physical, which the TE claims is errant from the spiritual, which the TE grants as inerrant. How do they accomplish this? By demonstrating that the Bible is wrong in its physical teachings! For example, they cite Psalm 93:1 as an example of the Bible errantly influenced by the ancient Near Eastern cosmology of its day:

·       The LORD reigns; he is robed in majesty; the LORD is robed; he has put on strength as his belt. Yes, the world is established; it shall never be moved.

From this verse, the TEs erroneously claim that the Bible teaches that the earth cannot be moved because it sits on a pedestal as the ancient cosmologists had believed. However, they conveniently fail to consider the fact that the righteous also “shall never be moved.” Clearly, this is not because they too are glued to a pedestal (Psalm 125:1; 16:8). Instead, God will not allow His righteous ones to be destroyed. Similarly, He will not allow His creation to be destroyed or “moved.”

The Bible does not ignorantly teach ancient cosmology. Instead, I’d like to cite evidence that the Bible wasn’t corrupted by ancient “science” but instead anticipated the findings of modern science:

1.    TIME IS NOT ETERNAL AS BIG BANG COSMOLOGY ASSERTS: 2 Tim. 1:9 [God] who has saved us and called us to a holy life--not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the BEGINNING OF TIME.

2.    THE UNIVERSE HAD A BEGINNING: Genesis 1:1 “In the BEGINNING God created the heavens and the earth.” (Contra the steady-state theory that had ruled science).

3.    THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF THE PHYSICAL WORD AREN’T VISIBLE: Hebrews 11:3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was NOT made out of what was visible.

4.    THERE ARE LAWS OF SCIENCE: Jeremiah 33:25 This is what the LORD says: 'If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the FIXED LAWS of heaven and earth, (Also Job 38:33)

5.    WATER CYCLE: Job 36:27 "He DRAWS UP the drops of water, which distill as rain to the streams.” (Also Amos 9:6)

6.    DINOSAURS?? Psalm 74:14 It was you who crushed the heads of Leviathan and gave him as food to the creatures of the desert. (Isa 27:1; 51:9; Jer. 51:34; Eze 29:3)

7.    COSMIC EXPANSION, ROUND EARTH: Isaiah 40:22 He sits enthroned above the CIRCLE of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and SPREADS THEM OUT like a tent to live in. (Scripture claims that the universe was created, rather than having existed eternally, as the atheist had supposed.) (42:5)

8.    STARS AS GUIDES TO SEASONS AND GEOGRAPHIC POSITIONS: Genesis 1:14 lights in the expanse of the sky… [would] serve as SIGNS to mark seasons and days and years.”

9.    COUNTLESS STARS: Jeremiah 33:22  “I will make the descendants of David my servant and the Levites who minister before me as COUNTLESS AS THE STARS of the sky and as measureless as the sand on the seashore." (Also Job 11:7-8; 22:12)

10. THE EARTH DOES NOT SIT ON A PEDESTAL AS ANCIENT COSMOLOGY HAS IT: Job 26:7 He spreads out the northern skies over empty space; he suspends the earth over NOTHING.

11. STRESS NEGATIVELY IMPACTS HEALTH: Proverbs 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

12. UNHEALTHY QUALITY OF EXCREMENT: Deut. 23:12-13 Designate a place outside the camp where you can go to relieve yourself. As part of your equipment have something to dig with, and when you relieve yourself, dig a hole and cover up your excrement.

13. FOSSIL FINDS IN THE MOUNTAINS PROVIDING EVIDENCE OF A WORLDWIDE FLOOD: Psalm 104:6 …the waters stood ABOVE the mountains.

Don’t be too impressed with this kind of evidence. Why not? This evidence is only as persuasive as are the findings of modern-day scholarship, to which I do not want to give undue weight. However, this evidence is powerful in the face of Bible detractors who argue that the Bible fails to accord with our present-day scientific consensus.

In fact, all forms of external evidence – whether deemed as positive of negative, supportive or detractive - relies on the present status of the scholarly consensus. Therefore, if the “evidence” against the Bible is acceptable, then evidence for the Bible must be equally acceptable.

I have just touched upon a small sample of the various ways that the Bible receives external verification from the surrounding physical world. Consequently, we can spend more than an entire lifetime exploring this almost limitless subject.