The Five Witnesses of the Bible

Over a lifetime of use, over the lifetimes of my ancestors, over the lifetimes of my brothers and sisters in Christ, over the lifetimes of billions of Christians the Bible has proved itself to be a reliable guide to all necessary spiritual truth. Most people who believe there is just one God believe He speaks at least in some part of the Bible - Christians, Jews, and Moslems (who claim to be the descendants of Abraham.) This has been true throughout history. That is currently about 3 Billion worldwide. That is our testimony to you. However, the scriptures themselves require more.

Percents of languages not yet translated

All or portions have been translated into over three thousand languages. The Bible typically sells over 100 million copies every year making it the best seller on any list. This is because it is the book of God's communication to man. People all over the world now have an opportunity to read it and to know God.

There are over 2,000 specific prophecies in the Bible which have already been fulfilled. This is particularly astounding when we recall that there are no such prophecies in the ‘scriptures’ of any other religion…For example, the writings of Buddha are totally lacking in any sort of specific predictive prophecy about the things of the future. In the writings of Confucius, there is absolutely nothing of any predictive prophecies. In the case of the Koran, the scriptures of the Muslims, we find only the prophecy of Mohammed that he would return to Mecca, a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy,’ which he himself, of course, fulfilled. This is quite different from the prophecy of Christ, who said that he would rise from the dead. And that is just one of thousands of prophecies that occur in the Scriptures and which are of the most specific, concrete, and definite nature.

Deuteronomy 28:64

The people of Israel would be scattered worldwide. By 70 A.D. Jewish communities existed in the Middle East and on the Mediterranean coasts. Jews followed the Romans into Europe and from Persia and Babylonia spread as far east as China. In modern times, Jews have migrated to the rest of the world. Despite the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, the vast majority of the Jewish people remain scattered around the world.

Amos 9:14-15

Jacob's descendants would regain control of Israel. This prophet lived about 2700 years ago, during a time when the people of Israel were being forced out of their homeland by a succession of foreign invasions. Despite many centuries of exile, many Jews returned to Israel and in 1948 reclaimed sovereignty over a portion of their ancient homeland.

Isaiah 14:23

The Messiah would be silent before his accusers. 700 years later, as explained in Matthew 27:12-14, this is what happened to Jesus. He was falsely accused but remained silent and did not protest the accusations.

Isaiah 53:7

Babylon, which had been a world power at two different times in history, would be reduced to swampland. After Cyrus conquered it in 539 BC, it never again rose to power. Archaeologists excavated Babylon during the 1800s. Some parts of the city could not be dug up because they were under a water table that had risen over the years.

Deuteronomy 28:64-67

The Jews would be persecuted in the lands where they were scattered. The Jews were intensely persecuted in Europe and Russia during the Crusades and Pogroms of the Middle Ages. Wherever they lived under Muslim rule they have been intensely persecuted. During the Holocaust of World War II, the Nazis killed about one-third of the world’s population of Jews.

Deuteronomy 29:23

Israel would become a wasteland. Mark Twain wrote this, in 1867, about the land of Israel, which at the time was called Palestine: "Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes… the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies… Palestine is desolate and unlovely… It is a hopeless, dreary, heartbroken land."

Isaiah 41:18-20

Trees would flourish again in a desolate Israel. In Israel they have constructed a vast irrigation system to improve farming. During the past century, more than 200 million trees have been planted in Israel.

Zechariah 9:9

The prophet speaks of a future king presenting himself to Jerusalem while riding on a humble donkey. 500 years later, as explained in Luke 19:35-37, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey and presented Himself as the Messiah, the King.

Ezekiel 26:12

You have to read above in verses 4 and 7

Tyre's stones, timber and soil would be thrown into the sea. Alexander the Great attacked Tyre in 333-332 BC. He took the rubble from Tyre's mainland ruins and tossed it - stones, timber and soil - into the sea, to build the land bridge to the part that was on an island off shore. The bridge is still there to this day.

The purpose here is not to explain what a great science text the Bible is, (it is not), but rather to show that it is consistent with scientific facts. There are some so-called scientific theories that disagree with the Bible but there are no known scientific facts that contradict the Bible. Here are a few scientific concepts and the scriptures that agree with them. Many of them were listed in the Bible hundreds or even thousands of years before being recorded elsewhere or "discovered" by modern science. These are not stated in the technical jargon of modern science, of course, but in terms of the basic world of man's everyday experience; nevertheless, they are completely in accord with the most modern scientific facts:

The description of Behemoth in Job 40:15-24 matches what paleontologists call a Brachiosaurus.

Ecclesiastes 1:4-7

Describes the motion of the winds long before the advent of modern meteorology.

Hebrews 1:11-12

Describes the wearing down of the creation (The second law of thermodynamics)

Isaiah 55:9

Describes the almost infinite extent of the universe beyond our solar system.

2 Peter 3:7 & Psalm 102:25-27

Is similar to the law of increasing entropy & the law of conservation of mass and energy

Jeremiah 33:22

Only about 3,000 stars can be seen with the naked eye and therefore could have been counted even in ancient times and yet the writers at the time seemed to know what scientists did not know until the invention of the telescope thousands of years later.

I Corinthians 15:41

Modern astronomy has shown that no two stars are identical which is a fact that is not obvious without a telescope and sophisticated light measuring technology.

Job 26:7

The Earth floats through space resting on nothing at all. This fact was not "discovered" by science until the fourteenth century.

Job 28:25

About four hundred years ago science "discovered" that air has weight.

Genesis 7:11

Hot water fountains or springs are found deep in the ocean and are a recent discovery

Much of the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, contains verifiable historical facts. All those kings names, nations, and wars it records matches the written, historical, and archeological facts that are known from other sources. There have been accusations in the past that certain archeological evidence contradicted the Bible but in every case when they dug a little deeper the Bible turned out to be true. Consider the case of Lot's door. Two angels were sent to rescue the nephew of Abraham from the coming destruction of Sodom inGenesis 19:1-17. In the story a door is shut twice.

Greek Text

There are a few old Greek texts of the New Testament that do not agree with each other in all details. There are even fewer ancient Hebrew texts of the Old Testament that do not agree with each other. What the above statement means is we believe there are no significant Christian doctrines that are affected by these "textual" difficulties.