60 Second Christianity

What are the roles of the Trinity? What do the various members of the Trinity do? Well, there are some places in the Bible that give is a glimpse of the different roles. One of the places we can look to see this is in the creation account. All three members of the Trinity played a different part. In Genesis 1:9-10, we learn that God spoke the earth into existence. Later on in John 1:3, the Bible tells us that God the Son, or Jesus, carried out those words. It says that “All things were made through him.” And, Genesis 1:2 teaches us that during creation, the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. They were each involved but in different ways.

Does the doctrine of the Trinity mean that there are really three Gods, and not just one? Let me begin by noting that we need to be comfortable with the reality that there are things about God we can't fully understand. The Trinity is one of those things. The Bible is clear that God exists as three distinct persons. But the Bible is also clear that there is only one God. There are not three God. There's one God. One of the clearest places we can turn in the Bile to know this is Deuteronomy 6:4 which makes the definitive statement: “The LORD is one.” The Bible often repeats that truth in other places. One example that you can look up and read is Isaiah 45:5.

Are the three members of the Trinity the same? No they're not. The Bible teaches that God exists as three distinct persons. What that means is that the Father is not the Son or the Holy Spirit. The Son is not the Father or the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not the Father or the Son. In the last couple of episodes, I mentioned some Bible passages that teach this. Each of the three persons of the Trinity is fully God. God the Father is fully God. Jesus us fully God. The Holy Spirit is fully God. So while they are distinct from one another, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each God. THIS DIAGRAM might help you.

Did Jesus believe in the Trinity? Last time, I mentioned how the Bible begins by presenting God as a Trinity, even though the word Trinity is not in the Bible. Jesus also taught that he was part of a Trinity. Toward the end of his time on earth, he commissioned his disciples to carry on the mission. In Matthew 28:19, Jesus said this: “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” Jesus believes that there are three distinct members of the Trinity. The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are three distinct persons. You'll also find this in Jude 20–21 if you want to read another passage. 

Where in the Bible should we look to find the Trinity? Well, the word Trinity is never found in the Bible. However, the word Trinity is used to describe a truth that's found in many places in the Bible. In fact, the Bible starts out, right at the beginning, with the concept of God existing as a Trinity. For instance, in Genesis 1:26 God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” The Bible's use of the words "us" and "our" tells us that more than one person was involved in the creation of the world. It's as if the Father, Son, and Spirit are having a conversation with each other as they plan the creation. I'll give you another example next time.

With this episode, I begin a series on what we call the Trinity. When you hear Christians talk about God, you'll hear them use different names. For example, we might say simply God or the Father. There's Jesus Christ and there's the Holy Spirit. But those names are not just different names for one person. They are actually the names of three different persons. Here's the part that's difficult to understand. God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit always existed, and they've existed as three distinct persons. But, there is only one God. That's what we mean when we talk about the Trinity. One God, in three persons. We'll talk about that more, over several podcasts. 

With all of God’s different attributes, how do they work together? The best way to think about that is the word unity. Sometimes one of God’s attributes might be emphasized more than the others. Some of his attributes even seem to be in conflict. For example, God’s love and God’s wrath seem to be opposites. However, the truth is that all of God’s attributes are in perfect harmony and God is unified in his attributes. It would be wrong to think that God is more of one of his attributes and less of another. It would also be wrong to think that at some points in history God was one thing and at other points, he was another. God is every attribute, completely and always.

Jesus said this in Matthew 5:48: “Your heavenly Father is perfect.” So what does it mean to be perfect? For something to be perfect requires two things. It must possess every quality that is desirable and excellent, and it must lack everything that would be considered a flaw or undesirable. For example, a perfect diamond would have every single quality that makes a diamond great, and it couldn’t have any flaws or any undesirable qualities. To say that God is perfect means that he possesses only excellent qualities and there’s no desirable quality that God doesn’t have. You and I can’t be perfect in this lifetime but we can strive to be more like God each day.

What things are impossible for God? The last couple episodes have explored God’s omnipotence and I said that God can do whatever he pleases. What, if any, are the things that God cannot do? Well, the only limits on what God can do are internal limits based on God’s own character. God can’t do things that violate other aspects of his nature or character. Here’s some examples. Titus 1:2 includes this phrase: “God, who never lies.” God cannot lie. Or James 1:13 which includes the phrase "God cannot be tempted with evil.” But again, the reason God can't do these things is because they violate his own character. Nothing outside of God can keep him from doing anything.

How does the Bible define and describe God’s omnipotence? The Bible teaches that God is omnipotent. This means that God can do anything he wants to do as long as it's consistent with his attributes and nature. The best way to think about this is that there is nothing that limits or hinders God. He can do whatever he decides to do. The Apostle Paul told us in Ephesians 3 that God “is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think.” Whatever you think you need God to do for you, he can do that, and he can do more than what you can even think up. Jesus said it like this: “With God all things are possible” God’s power is infinite.

What does it mean that God is omnipotent? The word can be rendered all-powerful. God himself provided the biblical definition of his omnipotence when he appeared to Abraham and asked this rhetorical question in Genesis 18: “Is anything too hard for the LORD?” In other words, there is nothing that God cannot do that he wants to do. God has internal limits on his own actions that are based on his character. For example, God can’t lie. In fact, God can’t commit any sin. But we need to understand that anything God can’t do is based on his own character. There is nothing outside of God that can thwart his will, or prevent him from doing anything he wants. He has the power to do whatever he pleases.

How should we understand the wrath of God? God provides a means of salvation from his judgment, but he still hates sin and his wrath burns toward all sin. Wrath can be thought of as intense hatred. When we talk about God’s wrath, we’re referring to his intense hatred toward sin. At some point, in God’s timeline of history, his wrath will be unleashed against sinners. John said this in John 3:36: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” In that one verse, we have the certainty of God’s wrath toward all who reject him, but we also have the offer of deliverance for those who believe.

In the last two episodes, I talked about righteousness and justice. The fact that God is both righteous and just has huge implications. One thing it means for us is that God always treats people as they deserve. Without partiality, he punishes all sin and everything that is against his will and nature. While that is true, God also offers forgiveness, and those whom God has forgiven will not be punished. How can that be? Well, God established a system of justice whereby someone who didn’t deserve punishment could step in and take someone else’s punishment. That’s what Jesus did when he died. God’s righteousness and justice were satisfied by Jesus, and in turn, God can forgive those who respond in faith.

What is justice? When we perceive injustice, we’re outraged by it. Humans are born with a need for justice, but we don’t always know what it means. I’ve always defined justice as equal treatment under the law. That fit’s closely with what the Bible says. Leviticus 19:15 says: “You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor.” So, justice has at is core a lack of partiality. By way of example, racism is a form of injustice because it reveals partiality based on skin color. Biblical justice demands that we’re not lenient to some groups and harsh to others, but that we remove partiality in our judgments.

What does it mean that God is righteous? The easiest way to understand God’s righteousness is to know that everything he does is the right thing to do. Moses said it like this in Deuteronomy 32:4. Speaking of God, he said: “The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.” Simply put, it means that God always does what is right. By the way, this is part of what it means to be God. That’s because God is the standard of what is right. As humans, if we want to do what is right and good, we don’t define what that means for ourselves. The way for us to do what is right is to follow God’s commands and his moral character.

How does God's holiness relate to us? Well, for the Christian, the implications are significant. The Bible tells us that the holiness of God provides Christians with an example that we are supposed to follow. We certainly can’t do it perfectly as God can, but we are supposed to live lives of holiness and seek to remove sin from our lives. God declared to his people in Leviticus 19:2 that “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.” Now remember, this is what we strive for, even though we often fail. Hebrews 12:14 says “Strive for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” So, Because God is holy, those who seek to follow him pursue holiness as well.

Is God selfish? God is holy in that he can’t sin. God is also the one who determines what is or is not sin. So for God to be holy means that he is devoted to his own will, and devoted to continually pursuing his own honor and glory. I used to be a children’s pastor and children struggled with this because it seems selfish. It’s not. If I live my life in pursuit of my own glory, that would be sinful. It’s idolatry to honor anything above God. But we need to remember that the same is true for God himself. If God were to pursue the honor and glory of something other than himself, he would be committing idolatry, which he can’t do. Because he is holy, he must pursue his own glory.

The Bible declares that God is holy. One very clear example of that is Psalm 99:9 where David gives us this command: “Exalt the LORD our God, and worship at his holy mountain; for the LORD our God is holy!” To be holy means to set apart from what is worldly or common, and to be completely separated from sin. So there is nothing about God that is impure or sinful. Everything that he does is right and good. In 1 John 1:5, John didn’t use the word holy but he described what holiness is when he said this: “This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” Nothing about God is or ever could be sinful. God is holy.

A few episodes back, I read a verse from 1 John where Jesus is said to be the propitiation for our sin. That’s a word that most people don’t use often, but it’s important to know what it means. Webster dictionary defines it as “the act of gaining or regaining the favor or goodwill of someone.” That accurately represents how the word is used in the Bible. Because of our sin, we are out of favor with God. Jesus accomplished propitiation for us. His sacrifice appeased God’s wrath and made it possible for us to have God’s favor. Not because of what we’ve done, but because of what Jesus did for us when he died on the cross for our sins. We simply respond in faith.

Why is racism a blasphemy against God? It is, and here’s why. The Bible tells us that God created the first human couple and that all humans since then are descendants from that one family. Any belief that one person is inherently better than another, violates God’s created order. He created one human race, and we are all part of it. In Genesis chapter 12, God called Abraham to be the father of the faith and declared that in Abraham, all the nations of the world would be blessed. Then in Revelation 7, John sees a vision of people from every nation and language worshiping together before the throne. From beginning to end, the gospel unites us in Christ, and God’s Word teaches that racism in any form is sin. Thanks for listening.

I’ve spent the last few episodes considering God’s love, and today I turn it around to consider our love for each other. The Bible says that because God loves us, we are able to share that love with the people in our lives. Jesus said this in Matthew 22: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” We all know how hard that really is. Loving people as God expects is only possible because God loved us first. We are to take God’s love for us and share that same love with others. John said it like this: “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Does God love sinners? Well, the simple answer to that is "yes" and a key truth to remember if you’re a Christian is that God loved you before you loved him. In fact, that’s part of what makes God’s love so amazing - he gives it to sinners like us. Paul said this in Romans 5:8: “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” People sometimes make the false assumption that God loves people who are good. Or maybe you tend to think that God will love you more tomorrow if you could be better today. That’s not how God’s love works. The ultimate expression of God’s love for you - his death - happened for you and all people while we were still in sin.

Last time I mentioned that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have eternally demonstrated love. The really good news for us is that God chose to direct his love toward us as well. When John was helping us understand what it means to love, he said this in 1John 4:10 “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” I’ll need to look at the word “propitiation” in a future episode. But for now, the key truth is that God decided to take this eternal quality that he possesses - love - and direct that love it toward his children. If you are the child of God, you are the everlasting recipient of God’s love.

One of the Bible’s famous verses is 1John 4:8 which tells us that “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” In answer to the question, “Who is God?” or “What is God?”, I’ve heard Christians reply by simply saying “God is Love!” The theological truth behind the concept of God being love is that for all eternity, God has been actively giving of himself for the good of others. When I say “all of eternity” I mean that literally. For example, in John 17:24, Jesus was speaking to God the Father and he said: “you loved me before the foundation of the world.” Even before the universe began, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all demonstrated love for each other.

The last two episodes have focused on the fact that God knows everything. He knows everything that has or will happen, and he knows the infinite number of things that could have happened but didn’t. I want to pause today and comment on the fact that God’s omniscience should be a source of comfort for the Christian. As you experience the events of your life, you likely have times of joy and times of sorrow and distress. While those times might take you by surprise, they are never a surprise to God. Before he created the universe, he knew you, and he knew all the events that would transpire in your life. You can take comfort that no matter what happens, God was not surprised and he is in control.

Last time I said that God knows everything, but that he didn’t learn what he knows. There’s never a time when God doesn’t know something and comes to know it later. God knows everything there is to know about himself, and everything there is to know about the universe. To take God’s omniscience even further, he doesn’t just know all that there is. He also knows all that there could have been. For example, when he created the universe, he could have created different kinds of creatures. If you had made different choices yesterday, things might be different for you today. The weather where you live could have been different today. There’s an infinite number ways things could have been, and God knows them all.

What does God know? One of the core attributes of God is that he is omniscient. What that means is that God knows everything. In 1 John, John wrote about love being the mark of the Christian and how the presence of love can reassure us that we are really saved. Then he said this: “For whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. But God doesn’t know things the way you and I know things. Everything that you know, there was a time when you didn’t know it. You learned it. Someone taught you, or you observed it or you figured it out. God doesn’t learn. There’s never a time when God doesn’t know something and comes to know it. He simply knows everything.

If God is invisible, how is it that some authors of the Bible say that they saw him? Even though God is a spirit being and is not confined to a body, there are times when God revealed himself by taking on a form that could be seen. One example of that is something Abraham experienced. Genesis 18:1 says this: “And the LORD appeared to him by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the door of his tent in the heat of the day.” God took on some sort of a visible form that Abraham was able to see and have a conversation with. Of course, God was seen clearly in the person of Jesus. The incarnation involved Jesus taking on a human body.

The last two podcasts looked at the idea of God being omnipresent. The reason that’s possible is because God is not confined to a body. God is a spirit, and therefore, we would also affirm that God is invisible. Even though God is present, with you, wherever you are listening to this, you can’t see him. The nature of his being is spirit, and we are beings who have bodies. We can see and touch and feel the physical world, but not the spirit world. The Apostle John put it like this in John 1:18: “No one has ever seen God.” We will see God in heaven when we have a different kind of body, but for now, God is invisible to us.

Last time, I said that God is everywhere at the same time. Someone asked me if that means God is in hell. The answer has to be yes. Hell is part of God’s creation and if God is omnipresent, He is present in hell. The way to think about this is to remember that even though God is everywhere, he acts differently in different places. For the believer, both now and in heaven, God’s presence will bring blessing. David said this in Psalm 16:11: “In your presence, there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” But for God’s enemies, His presence will bring punishment as he displays his justice. It’s God, not Satan, who created and rules over hell. So yes, he is present there.

Where is God? Well, that’s sort of a trick question. Many people might say God is in heaven. The truth is that God is everywhere. The word we use to describe that is omnipresent. The prefix omni means all. So the word omnipresent means that God is present everywhere. There are no limits on God regarding where he is or where he can be. You have a body, and your body can only be in one place. If you’re in Singapore right now, you can’t also be in India. God doesn’t have size dimensions or an amount of space that he takes up. He is present in every point of the universe at the same time. This does not mean that everything is God. That would be pantheism. But it means there is no place where God is not present.

I’ve been looking lately at the truth that God is eternal. I said that God doesn’t experience time as we do. The events that we experienced as our past, or the things that we have not yet experienced, and are our future, are all in the present to God. However, sometimes the authors of the Bible explain this by using time references. Peter wrote that “with the Lord, a thousand years is as one day.” He also turned that around and said “one day is as a thousand years.” Peter’s reference to time doesn’t contradict the truth that God is eternal. He wasn’t teaching that God experiences time at a different pace from us. He was illustrating the truth that God is eternal with the contrast between 1 year and 1000 years.

Last time I mentioned that exists outside of time. When I was a Children’s Pastor, I tried to help kids understand this by using the analogy of a parade. When we watch a parade, it comes by us as a sequence of floats and bands and performances. When we’re sitting on that curb, we see what’s in front of us. We can remember what’s already gone by us, but that’s the past. We begin to hear what is still coming toward us, but that’s the future. That’s still to come. In this analogy, God would be up above, and he would see the whole parade at one time. Everything that we experience as our past, present, and future, God experiences all at once. Everything is in the present for God because he’s not bound by time.

Last time I said that God is eternal. He never had a beginning and will never have an end. It’s difficult for us to grasp this, but before anything else existed, God was there. And he will always exist. But even in talking about God being eternal, we use references to time because we don’t have any other frame of reference that we can relate to. We talk about eternity past and eternity future. But the reality is that God is outside of time. He doesn’t experience events in succession like you. You’ve had events that happened in your past, you have the events of your life today, and you’ll have more events happen tomorrow and into the future. For God, everything is the present and he experiences it all at once.

What does it mean that God is eternal? For something to be eternal would require that it never had a beginning and that it will never have an end. In the entire universe, there is nothing that’s eternal except for God. God did not begin and he will not end. One place we can go in the Bible to learn this is Psalm 90, verse 2. The English Standard Version says this: “Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.” That Psalm is attributed to Moses and when he said from everlasting to everlasting, he was looking in both directions - eternity past and eternity future. God is always present, no matter how far back or how far forward you go.

Last time, I said that that there are aspects of God that never change. In saying that, we also need to remember that God does act differently and feel differently in different situations. For example, the Bible tells us that God loves all people. The Bible also tells us that God will act differently toward those who place their faith in him as compared to those who reject him. He acts differently in each of those cases. It’s critical for Christians to understand this. God hates the sin of Christians and much as he hates the sin of those who reject him, but his response is very different because he has forgiven the sins of his children. So, instead of being the recipients of his anger, we are the recipients of his compassion.

The Bible tells us that there are many aspects of God that are unchangeable. In particular, he’s unchangeable in his being, his attributes, his purposes, and his promises. In each of those areas, God is unique in this regard. As humans, our being or nature changes. For example, someday we will exchange our current bodies with new and glorified bodies. Our attributes change. Even the things that we intend to do and the promises we make can change. But in each of those areas, God doesn’t change. His nature and attributes are always and forever the same. Everything he intends to do will be done. Every promise will be kept. And that's good news because we know we can count on him and trust him in all that he has said.

Is it possible to know God? The Christian response is yes, and no. We can’t know everything there is to know about God. We’re bound by the confines of space, time and limited knowledge. God doesn’t have any of those limitations. God is omnipresent, infinite and omniscient. The Bible says in Psalm 145 that God’s greatness is unsearchable. In other words, we’ll never fully know him. Thankfully, Jesus became a man and lived here on earth. Jesus was known and he told us that if we know Him, we know God the Father. Though we can’t know God perfectly, we can know God personally in Jesus. And that’s far better and more important because that's how we find eternal life.

Do humans share a universal sense that there is a God? Despite how an atheist or agnostic might think, Christians would answer yes, and here’s why. The Bible teaches that God created all people, in all places and at all times with an inner sense that he exists. In Romans 1:19, Paul talks about people who don’t believe in God and he says this: “What can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them.” When people don’t believe this, Paul said in verse 25 that it’s because they exchanged the truth for a lie. So, the Christian belief is that those who don’t believe in God have rejected an inner sense that God has placed in all people.

Does God exist? When you read the Bible, you don’t find an argument for the proof of God’s existence. There’s no passage that lays out the case or responds to the premise, "Here’s how you know there is a God." Philosophers and theologians have laid out arguments for the existence of God, and there are many books that talk about that. When you come to the Bible, the Bible simply assumes that God exists. In fact, the Bible begins with the assumption that there is a God. It says “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” The Bible then goes on to introduce us to that God. So, the Bible is very matter-of-fact regarding the existence of God.

The doctrine of the Bible’s sufficiency implies that an action is not a sin unless the Bible says it is. Christians also distinguish between something being sinful and something being wise. Asking the question “is what I’m about to do a sin?” is a great place to start, but it’s not the only question. For example, a behavior might not be a sin, but there might be some good reasons to avoid or limit that behavior. My point in the last episode was not to say we should do whatever we want as long as it’s not a sin. My point was to clarify that we should not call things sin unless the Bible does.

Since Christians believe that the Bible is God’s Word, that means there’s no higher authority. Stated positively, it means that we do as the Bible commands. But it also means that we don’t add commands to the Bible that’s aren’t there. To say it another way, nothing is a sin that the Bible doesn’t classify as sin, either by clear teaching or by principle. I grew up in a tradition that tended to do this. For example, we thought it was sinful to use playing cards because some people use cards for gambling. The proper way to think about our behavior is that the Bible is sufficient in what it teaches so we don’t add to or take away from any of its commands.

God told us everything we need to know to live as Christians. But what if the Bible doesn’t mention a particular topic? When we don't have clear instructions in the Bible, Christians we use principles from the Bible to make decisions. Let me give an example. The Bible doesn’t have a command telling us what day the church should gather. However, in the Bible, the first Christians gathered on The Lord’s Day or Sunday. Based on that example, the church I’m part of meets on Sunday. It’s not a sin to meet on another day because the Bible doesn’t give a command to meet on Sunday. But we’ve made a decision based on a principle that we find in the Bible.

The Bible contains everything we need to know to have and maintain a relationship with God. The theological term to describe that is “sufficiency”. Or the sufficiency of Scripture. Based on this belief, if we want to know what God thinks about something, we search the Bible to find out. Not everything that humans could possibly know is in the Bible. My son Chad can’t read the Bible for sports predictions. The Bible doesn’t tell us everything about math or science or history. But everything God wanted us to know about becoming and living as a Christian is in the Bible, and nowhere else. It gives us all the guidance we need to know God and live obediently.

The purpose of the Bible was for God to reveal himself and his plan of redemption to us. Everything that we need to know about having a relationship with God is given to us in the Bible. That's why the Bible is so important. To take this thought one step further, we would say that without the Bible, we could not how to have a relationship with God. We would invent our own ideas those ideas would look nothing like what God has actually said. The only place to find the truth about God is in the Bible. People who seek to lead or teach others about God need to base that teaching on the Bible and not on opinion. Paul told us in Romans 10 that faith comes by hearing and hearing through the word of God.

Episode 7 discussed disagreements over how to understand or interpret a passage of scripture. I want to pick up on that theme again today. It's very difficult to approach reading or studying the Bible without preconceived ideas of what it says. That often leads to wrong conclusions. Another problem is that we encounter passages we don't like or that we don't want to obey. We're tempted to look for a way of thinking about that passage that gets us off the hook. Properly understanding what the Bible says requires that we approach it wanting to know what God has communicated. So we read the Bible carefully and prayerfully, seeking to know exactly what it is that God wants to say, and what he wants us to do as a result.

Over the years I've read hundreds of books and heard thousands of messages about the Bible. Like me, you've probably noticed that people disagree regarding what the Bible teaches. People interpret passages from the Bible differently and draw different conclusions. One key truth to keep in mind is that when those disagreements occur, the problem is not with the Bible. Disagreement over how to understand the Bible doesn’t make the Bible untrue. When people have contradictory conclusions about what the Bible says or means, someone is wrong and the answer is to keep reading and studying. Keep in mind that God wants us to know Him. Portions of the Bible might seem hard to understand, but they can be understood over time with study.

Is the Bible accurate? The short answer is yes. I don't want to waiver in that answer, but it does require a little bit of explanation. The purpose of the Bible is to present to us God's story of redemption and how it is that we can enter into a relationship with Him. The Bible wasn't written as a science textbook or even a complete history of the world. But, if the Bible presents something as true, then it’s true. For example, if the Bible presents an event as having happened, then that event happened. The Bible is true in what it declares to be true. It doesn't tell us everything, but what it does tell us is factual. So, is the Bible true? The answer is yes, everything the Bible presents as true is true.

One criticism of the Christian belief that the Bible is God’s Word is that we ultimately have to rely on the Bible itself to support the claim. It’s in the Bible that God tells us that He’s responsible for the content of the Bible. We can look to other types of evidence to verify the accuracy of the Bible, but ultimately, the Bible is its own authority. However for Christians, another factor comes into play, and that’s conviction. Those who embrace the Bible as true will often talk about the fact that the Bible is unlike any other book, and that as they read it, they come to believe it. The Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit makes the words of Scripture come alive in the hearts of those with faith to believe.

Hebrews 1 tells us that God spoke to the prophets in many ways. The human authors who wrote the books of the Bible received the content in different ways. Sometimes God spoke directly or gave a vision to the human author, and he wrote down what he saw or heard. Sometimes an author conducted eye-witness interviews, did research and put together an account like a journalist would do. And of course, some authors were themselves, an eyewitness to the things they wrote down. But here’s the important thing. No matter how the words came to the author, they are the exact words that God wanted to be written. We see in each biblical author a unique personality and style, but God is responsible for the content.

Last time, I was talking about the Bible being God’s Word. I quoted 2 Timothy 3:16 where Paul said that “all scripture is breathed out by God.” When Paul wrote that, the New Testament was being written, so Paul would have been thinking of Scripture as the Old Testament. But Christians also understand the New Testament to be God’s Word. One example of where we see this is in something that Peter wrote in 2 Peter 3:16. Peter referred to the writings of Paul, and then he said that Paul’s writing was in the same category as all the other scriptures. In other words, Peter considered what Paul wrote to be equal in status to the Old Testament. That’s one example of why we consider Paul’s writings to be God’s Word.