Do you ever wonder if God is real, or if those—who say the original writings compiled into the book we all now know as the Bible are not trustworthy and faith in the biblical Jesus Christ is misguided—could perhaps be correct…? This isn’t a foolish (or sinful) question; we should be convinced. God is not offended that we want to know we are believing truth, but we must approach this with intellectual integrity—we cannot begin our examination with a predetermined outcome, which we are simply trying to justify.
“For we were not making up clever stories when we told you about the powerful coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We saw his majestic splendor with our own eyes when he received honor and glory from God the Father [referring to the mountain transfiguration experience]. The voice from the majestic glory of God said to him, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.” We ourselves heard that voice from heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain. Because of that experience, we have even greater confidence in the message proclaimed by the prophets. You must pay close attention to what they wrote, for their words are like a lamp shining in a dark place—until the Day dawns, and Christ the Morning Star shines in your hearts. 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 1:16-21 NLT)
So the obvious first reason why we should believe these writings is because there were eyewitness accounts of those who personally saw and experienced Jesus Christ’s extraordinariness. Not in the sense of charisma, because we are never told He was charismatic. Neither are we told that He tried to gain a following. To the contrary; when it seemed the masses were too excited about Him multiplying the several loaves and fishes, and were thinking that He would be a great ruler over them (hence potentially jeopardizing Him being later crucified to pay the penalty for our sins)—at that point He threw out the very difficult teaching about eating His flesh (not meant literally, of course) that caused them to lose interest and dissipate.
No, the eyewitness account I’m referring to is described in today’s passage; it is of an audible voice Peter, James, and John heard on the day they saw Jesus transfigured and the long ago-dead Moses and Elijah with Him. But I can just hear the cynics of our time asking what they were smoking, so I’ll answer with what those familiar with first century Jewish culture already know—the religious focus was on pleasing God through keeping the Law; psychedelics and mind-altering substances were not part of the religious experience or culture, so they weren’t “on” anything.
But what if you’re still not convinced? Well—think about the beginning of the Christian teachings and faith in a broader sense.
Consider the nature of the actual teaching—of what they were saying. It’s that God is holy and any unholiness separates us from Him. Lying (which is what skeptics say they did) is the most basic of unholinesses, so if these people are being truthful about any of the account—if these things happened and they knew God is real—for them to lie about any particular aspect of it would be unthinkable; it would be so completely diametrically out of character for people of God; for those who believed what’s taught. By lying, which is intentional sin, they would be risking damning themselves; separating themselves from God eternally. So if you doubt specific portions of the message—don’t. If the message itself is true, all of it is credible because there is no conceivable situation in which anyone would lie, knowing what they already knew about God.
On the other hand, if these people were not being truthful—if they weren’t inspired by God and were making up the New Testament story (everything about Jesus)—their message would be so much more human; more sinful, sensual, lustful, earthly. Think of pagan writings; gods and goddesses doing their thing. It wouldn’t be like what it is, because human beings don’t generate these kinds of holy and selfless aspirations and thoughts on their own. Think also, of how the disciples are portrayed: as cowardly, unbelieving, unfaithful, confused, scared. The disciples are presented in a very unfavorable light; if they had fabricated the whole thing (or at least taken an only human Jesus and tried to portray him as a god), they’d have made themselves more heroic. Especially if they were devious, if their intent was to deceive; what they generated, what came from them, would be contorted and convoluted, not a call to purity and holiness, to humility, to self-denial. The writing speaks for itself because of what the message is: it is divine in origin by virtue of the content itself, because humans don’t generate those kinds of thoughts.
The Bible was put compiled (put together into one book from multiple sources) several hundred years after it was written, but of all ancient writings there are so many more copies made so much closer to that period than any other ancient writing, so it is credible textually. Yet while we don’t bat an eyelid to accept secular writings with fewer copies made much later from the original writing, we somehow seem to want to cast doubt on the credibility of the Bible. Why do you suppose this is?
It’s because the Bible is not of human origin. If it were human, it would not make claims on our life, nor would it stir such controversy. What we believe about the Bible—unlike what we believe about the writings of Homer, for example—matters. It matters, because if it is correct, we are very guilty ignoring it. That’s why people question its credibility incessantly and try their best to discredit it. Because of its very nature as from God.
Dear God,
Please open our eyes that we might finally see! In Jesus Christ’s name we pray, amen.
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