The Bible (part 4)

Faith comes from hearing the message (Romans 10:17).

As we finish looking at the books of the Bible, it’s time to discuss the Epistles. An epistle is a letter that is written to teach. Most of the epistles were written by people who knew Jesus personally—men like Paul, John, and Peter. They lived at a time when there were no telephones or cars; it took a lot of time to go from one city to another.

New churches were springing up over a vast area—too widespread for these men to visit frequently. So they composed letters that could be read out loud in church. These epistles were a combination of sermon and Bible study, but they were also personalized; each letter deals with concerns that are unique to a specific congregation.

The epistles help us understand God’s word. They help us to see the unity between Old Testament and New. They show us the patterns of thought woven throughout the Bible. They help us apply Jesus’ teachings to our everyday lives.

When congregations received these letters, they faced a quandary—they wanted to share the epistles with other congregations, but they didn’t want to let such precious words slip away from them. So they made copies to pass along; and as the years went by, every congregation tried to get copies of as many letters as possible. The desire so many had for a complete set resulted in lengthy meetings, meetings that eventually published the Bible as we know it.

Some people claim that the Bible is just a hodgepodge of human writings stitched together by the church. They claim that any continuity of thought between the covers is the result of editorial meddling with the original documents. They claim that any book predicting future events was written long after the fact, and designed to seem older than it really is. They claim that every miracle is pure fiction, invented by the church to make Christianity seem more appealing. But you know what? I can’t make you believe that the Bible is really God’s Book. Faith is a gift of God, which He gives through the Holy Spirit when you read or hear God’s words. That’s why I encourage you to pick up a Bible and read it for yourself. I hope that these sessions on the Bible have made you interested enough to look into it.