The
New Testament: Is it Reliable? That was the topic of the most recent
City Church gathering this past Sunday. Kyle Steven Bonenberger, Lead
Pastor of our church, stepped aside from speaking last Sunday and
invited teacher and author Sean McDowell to give his message.
It was a full house as McDowell
approached his podium. Sean's topic was whether or not the Bible was an accurately translated, historically attestable , reliable document. This caught my attention rather quickly, as I admit
to questioning the reliability of the Bible many times in my life.
Our guest speaker and apologist
explained that in order to prove a document to be reliable, it must pass three key tests on the document: an internal evidence test, a
biographical test and an external evidence test. Basically, the tests look at a document's text and external and biological facts as
evidence of the validity of the Bible.
One fact that caught my attention
was that that there are over 24,000 New Testament manuscripts. That
number is incredibly high considering there are far fewer manuscripts
of any other historical document. In essence, the more duplications of
a document we have, the better we can determine its validity. These
documents were also transcribed fairly close to the the originals we
have today.
Our guest speaker mentioned many
different ways we can prove the New Testament to be reliable, many of
which were also archeological finds. One of which addressed crucifixion
with nails, which has been questioned for years. This finding was of
Yohanan, who had been crucified with seven inch nails. All of these
findings had me thinking that there is so much that critics, who
question the validity of the Bible, don't know. As a former critic, I
was definitely uneducated on many of these facts.
I have always wanted someone to
give me a reason to see the Bible as true and valid document, and this
past Sunday, Sean McDowell presented to me and a club full of listeners
that historical documents, philosophical arguments and even scientific
evidence provide an in depth look into these aged writings.
Thank you Sean McDowell.
To see more photos from the Sean McDowell Event, click HERE.
Posted on
Thu, December 10, 2009
by India Quarles
filed under