It is Reasonable to Believe the BibleBy Pastor Tim KlassenEverybody believes something. Everybody has opinions. The heart of the matter is: what is it that you base your beliefs and opinions on? If the foundation of your system of belief is weak, then your reason for believing it is weak. Alternatively, if the foundation is strong, your reasons for believing would therefore be strong. I can say with great confidence that it is reasonable to believe in the Christian faith and the person of Jesus Christ as the Son of God — not merely because of my opinion or system of belief, but because of the book that my belief is based on: The Holy Bible.There is no shortage of popular criticisms about the Bible in our world today. Many believe it is outdated, unjustly discriminatory, and irrelevant to our lives. Yet, despite its critics, it has remained the best sold book every published, and the Church world-wide is growing at more rapid pace than it ever has before. Why is this? Simply put, because the Bible is true. Pastor Voddie Baucham has summarized it best by stating, “I choose to believe the Bible because it is a reliable collection of historical documents, written by eyewitnesses during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses. They report supernatural events that took place in fulfillment of specific prophecies and claimed their writings are divine and not human in origin.”Baucham’s statement is based on a passage of Scripture from the Apostle Peter (2 Peter 1:16-21). It outlines the profound reasonableness of believing the Bible to be true and trustworthy from beginning to end. The Bible, contrary to popular criticism, is not the collective work of a handful of men who got together and conspired over how to start a religious movement. The Bible is a library of 66 books, written by 40 authors from three continents, who wrote in three different languages over a period of 1,500 years, telling one singular, perfectly woven together story. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the Bible itself is a miracle!Those who penned the words of the Bible were, as the Apostle Peter notes, eyewitnesses to the events they recorded. Not only that, but they wrote and dispersed what they witnessed during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses, who would no doubt have had the opportunity to claim that what was written was not true. Yet no such historical documents claiming any falsehoods can be found!Some accuse the Bible of being untrustworthy because of a lack of early copies, claiming that the Bible we read today must be far different from the original copies (think of the “telephone” game, where what beings as one word vastly changes to something else several people later). However, we have more then 6,000 manuscripts of the New Testament written within two and a half decades of the original copies, all of which are so near-identical it is astounding. We have more historical documentation concerning the life, death and resurrection of Jesus than we have of Julias Caesar, Aristotle, Socrates and Homer’s Iliad! To top it off, there have been more than 23,000 archaeological digs which have all confirmed details recorded in Scripture.I believe it is so reasonable to believe the Bible and its message concerning Jesus that it should be considered unreasonable not to believe it is the Holy Word of God. When faced with all of the facts, there is actually a greater burden of proof upon the critic of the Bible to provide reasons to not believe than there is upon any Christian to provide reasons to believe that the Bible it is the Word of God.Why is it that so many people do not believe the Bible today? Firstly, because they do not know much of what I’ve written above. Secondly, because the moment we agree that the Bible is true and trustworthy, we can no longer stay the same. The Bible will compel us to change. The good news is this: change is precisely what we need to live a flourishing life! Will you say yes to a flourishing life, and allow the God who gave you life to reveal Himself to you through His Holy Word?