Bible Think

The Witness of Jesus Christ

Jesus is the person who has the greatest claim to teach truth about God and about mankind’s response to God. Above all, Jesus was raised from the dead, which underwrites his message in a unique way. We can trust the teaching of Jesus.

The Old Testament

Jesus’ teaching covered a wide range of different topics, but among these was teaching about the inspiration of Scripture. Among Jesus’ words about the Old Testament are the following:-

But Jesus answered them, "You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God."  (Matthew 22:29)

He said to him, 'If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.'"  (Luke 16:31)

And he said to them, "O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!  (Luke 24:25)

Not only does Jesus endorse the Scriptures (by which he must have meant the Old Testament) in specific passages like this, he also uses phrases to refer to passages from it which give a general confirmation of the Old Testament as having authority from God. For example, there are 18 places where Jesus uses the phrase “it is written” to refer to quotations from the Old Testament as sufficient evidence that whatever they referred to was true (for example Luke 24:46 - Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead). Similarly there are ten places in the Gospels where Jesus teaches the people with the phrase “Have you never read”.

The table below shows the proportion of the words of Jesus which are direct quotations from the Old Testament. The frequency with which Jesus quoted the Old Testament is quite surprising; in total 10% of Jesus’ recorded words are quotations of the Old Testament.

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Harmony of Message

The Bible was written in three different languages by over 35 different people from many different walks of life and in different parts of the world. It was written over a period of more than a thousand years. In spite of this it has a single consistent message. Click here for more discussion of this evidence.

Fulfilled Prophecy

The Bible contains accounts, often quite detailed, of events which were in the future when the prophecy was originally written. This page discusses the issue of fulfilled prophecy.

Inspiration

Click here to link to the main page for the section of this site on the inspiration of Scripture.

Scientific Statements

The Bible was written long before the discoveries of modern science. However, it contains information which is consistent with modern knowledge but which was not available to ancient civilisations.

Jesus Christ

Click here to see evidence for the authority of Jesus Christ.

Watch This Space!

The only conclusion that one can draw from this is that if one concludes that Jesus is authoritative then one must also conclude that the Old Testament is a message from God.

The New Testament

The case of the New Testament is slightly different. Jesus could not quote it during his ministry because it was not written before the resurrection. However, the Gospels do quote Jesus, extensively, and show that Jesus claims to have a message from God. If Jesus is to be trusted then his words are exactly such a message. However, Jesus also promised that the Apostles would receive divine assistance in compiling their writings:-

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.  (John 14:26)

The Apostles were to remember Jesus’ words, but were also to be taught what else to say and write. The Gospels and the Epistles were written by these people, or under their supervision. They also have the backing of Jesus Christ.

The Witness of Jesus Christ