Holy books

Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, "This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:45-49).

Our world is filled to overflowing with books advertised as ‘holy’. Go into any bookstore or library, and you can find countless works claiming to reveal the nature of God and how you can get to know Him. Some are familiar to you, at least by name: the Koran of the Muslims, the Jewish Kabbalah, the Book of Mormon. Other religious texts might not be so familiar—the oriental Tao-Te Ching, the Analects of Confucius, the Dhammapada of the Buddhists, the Bhagavad Gita of Hinduism. All of these works anchor different religions; all of them have been read by millions of people, if not more.

With all this religious literature floating around, what makes the Bible special? How can Christianity claim that the Scriptures are not only different, but fundamentally superior to every other collection of religious sayings?

How can you trust that what we are told about Jesus is true? The disciples spent three years at Jesus’ side, listening to Him teach. Think back over the last three years of your life; if you were asked to write down every conversation you heard during that time, how much could you remember? How accurate would your memories be? And the disciples did not write down what they heard right after Jesus rose from the dead; several years went by before they put pen to paper. How then can we have confidence that the disciples remembered their time with Jesus correctly?

As we read the Gospels, it is clear that the people who followed Jesus often did not understand what He said or what was really going on. Jesus spoke about Himself as the Good Shepherd and us as His sheep, but John tells us: Jesus used this figure of speech, but they did not understand what he was telling them (John 10:6). Jesus warned to be on guard against false teachings; He compared religious lies and half-truths to yeast that can quickly work through a whole loaf of bread, changing it dramatically. But the disciples did not understand what He was getting at, prompting Jesus to scold them with the words: Do you still not see or understand? (Mark 8:17) When Jesus told them that He was going to be put to death and three days later rise again, Mark records: they did not understand what he meant and were afraid to ask him about it (Mark 9:32). When the Lord rode a donkey into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and was greeted as a king, we are told: At first his disciples did not understand all this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him (John 12:16). And when Peter and John found Jesus’ tomb to be empty, the sad truth was: They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead (John 20:9).

We really should not be surprised at this—after all, the disciples were only human, ordinary men trying to understand the revelations of God. Nor were they experts in religion; they were unschooled, ordinary men (Acts 4:13). They were practical folks, their thoughts focused on the need to make a living and support their families. To learn the mysteries of God’s kingdom from His own Son must, at times, have been like trying to drink water from a fire hose. It is no wonder that Jesus devoted three years to patiently teaching them.

So why can we trust what the disciples wrote about Jesus, years after our Lord ascended back into heaven? Because of what Jesus did to them: He opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. Jesus performed a miracle—a miracle that benefited His disciples, and through them benefited us. The Lord cleared out their mental cobwebs, enabling them finally to understand. They were enabled to see how hundreds of references in the Old Testament spoke of Jesus and what would happen to Him. Now they understood everything that Jesus had tried to teach them, they finally ‘got’ the point of every parable, they understood the significance of each miracle. Over three years of association, Jesus had slowly given them the pieces to a puzzle, and now the Lord made everything fall into place, revealing a beautiful picture of God’s plan of salvation, realized through His Son.

A year earlier, Jesus had posed a question to His followers: he asked his disciples, "Who do people say the Son of Man is?" They replied, "Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets." "But what about you?" he asked. "Who do you say I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven" (Matthew 16:13-17). What was true of the disciples then is true for us now—no one can understand the truth about Jesus unless God intervenes. In 1st Corinthians chapter 12 Paul writes: no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit. This is because the man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned (1 Corinthians 2:14). Spiritual truths make sense only because of God’s miraculous work within us, and the same was true of Jesus’ disciples.

The Spirit of God was essential for the writing of the Bible. Jesus told the disciples: stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high. That power came on Pentecost, when the disciples were enabled by the Spirit to communicate with people in a variety of different languages. But just as important was another gift the Spirit would bring—Jesus promised: the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you (John 14:26). Jesus made sure that His faithful friends would remember every important conversation He had with them; the Spirit of God would see to it.

This is why you can trust what the Bible says. Our Lord used His godly power to ensure that the writers of the Good Book accurately remembered everything about their years with Jesus, and that they understood what it all meant. Men may have written the Bible, but Jesus made sure they got everything right. And so Peter could say, Above all, you must realize that no prophecy in Scripture ever came from the prophet's own understanding, or from human initiative. No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God (2 Peter 1:20-21). To this, Paul adds: All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

The disciples had a wealth of memories to preserve in writing; did they record everything? John gives us the answer: Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written (John 21:25). At the time of Jesus’ earthly ministry, books only existed in the form of scrolls, tubes of paper rolled onto two sticks, one held in each hand. Such technology limited how long a book could be; if a scroll were too big the paper would tear. This is why the Old Testament has First and Second Samuel, First and Second Kings, and so on—these books were too long to fit on one scroll, so the content was divided between two rolls of paper. When the books of the New Testament were written, space was still at a premium. So each evangelist set down what he considered to be the highlights of Jesus’ life. Matthew emphasized how many Old Testament prophecies Christ fulfilled, in order to convince Jewish readers that Jesus really was the promised Messiah. Mark focused on Jesus’ miracles, which proved His divinity and power to save. Luke preserved quite a bit of detail about Jesus’ life, starting with His conception and finishing up with His ascension into heaven; He also devoted a considerable amount of ink to Jesus’ parables. John wrote for educated foreigners; his focus was on the words of Jesus that revealed the heart and mind of God.

Between these four scrolls, God made sure that we have a well-rounded account of Jesus’ time on earth. We are told of a woman who, although she was a virgin, conceived and gave birth to a Child. The Child’s Father was none other than God Himself, and because of this, the Child was born sinless. This Child was named Jesus, and His life was one that honored God perfectly at all times. As an adult, this sinless Son of God assumed the role of Teacher, explaining how God wants us to live. Then, showing His great love for us, Jesus took on the role of Sacrifice, suffering and dying for our sins. After a brief stay in the grave, our Lord returned to life and ascended into heaven to be our everlasting King, a benevolent ruler who, if we pledge our loyalty to Him alone, forgives us when we admit our wrongs and takes us to join Him in paradise when we die.

So how do the Scriptures stack up when compared against the Koran, the Kabbalah, the Book of Mormon, the Tao-Te Ching, the Analects, the Dhammapada, or the Bhagavad Gita? These were all written by men—none are inspired by Christ. And why is Christ’s involvement so important? Heed Peter’s words, once he had ‘been clothed with power from on high’: There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12). Jesus said, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me (John 14:6). It only makes sense, then, that the one book which can reveal God is the one authorized by His Son—the Bible. So open the Scriptures and read—you can believe what Jesus’ followers have said about Him. God Himself made sure they got it right.