Let’s not soft-pedal this fact: Christianity’s claims about the Bible are patently absurd.

Pause and consider Christianity’s claim. Christians claim that we have in our possession a book that contains a message from the Creator of the universe to us. This book was written roughly between 4,000 and 2,000 years ago. To claim such an ancient book has any relevance whatsoever for a modern reader is a ludicrous enough claim, but to claim it is the word of the source of all life itself? That is hard to believe.

Isn’t this book written by human beings full of legends? Isn’t it full of contradictions? Hasn’t it been proven false?[i] How can we possibly trust that it is God's message for us?

Let me make the stakes of this conversation completely clear. If we can’t trust the Bible, then it’s a book that might have use for historians or perhaps to be read alongside Aesop’s Fables. It might evoke spiritual inspiration from time to time, but only within more reliable frameworks of understanding. But if it is the Word of God, we ought to devote ourselves to this book. If God really wrote a message to us, then every person is duty-bound to take this message seriously.

The skeptic’s challenge is that the Bible is a collection of stories and human wisdom, not reliable history and God’s truth. I’m going to respond to this challenge with seven responses. The first will be shared in this post, and the following six will be shared over the next two posts.

The most important question for the trustworthiness of the Bible is whether or not there was a man named Jesus Christ who lived in the first century in Palestine, who claimed to be the Messiah, who died on a cross at the hands of the Roman government, and rose again. The trustworthiness of the Bible stands or falls on its claims about Jesus of Nazareth.

If the assertion the Bible makes about Jesus isn’t true, then everything else falls apart. You don’t need to punch any other holes; those who are Christians are, at best, to be pitied, and at worst, to be mocked.[ii]

But if the assertion that the New Testament makes is true—that there was a Jewish man who lived in first-century Palestine, who claimed to be the Messiah, and who was crucified and then was resurrected from the dead—then everything else falls into place. If a man who claimed to be the Son of God was resurrected from the dead, then that is the most powerful proof of his claim that could ever be offered. And it is the most authoritative proof that the stories the Bible tells are true.

The first response to whether or not the Bible tells true history or is sharing fables and legends is to determine whether the writers thought they were writing history. That might seem like a silly place to start, but there are lots of books written that have markers that are not intended to be understood as history.

If, in 50 years, a group of people claimed that Harry Potter was a real person and the books of JK Rowling described true history, then we would want to turn to Rowling herself and see if that appeared to be her intent. And, it would be apparent to any discerning reader that while Rowling’s books contain a remarkable story filled with delightful characters and an imaginative world, it is clearly intended to be understood as fiction, not history.

In contrast, the Bible’s writers make it clear that they are not offering stories or moral tales. They believe they are telling the story of a real man.

Let’s consider the beginning of two of the gospels.

Matthew’s gospel begins this way:

“The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers…” (Matthew 1:1-2).

For 16 verses, Matthew tells us the line of ancestors of Jesus of Nazareth. He is making it crystal clear that Jesus was a historical figure, not the protagonist of a tale. Matthew is doing everything he can to make it clear that this is no “once upon a time” story; this is a true history in a real time and a real place about a man who is the descendant of real people, who can be traced independently for verification.

Matthew isn’t alone in setting up his gospel like this. Let’s turn and listen to how Luke begins his gospel. Luke writes,

“Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught” (Luke 1:1-4).

Luke apparently has been sent on a mission by his patron Theophilus[iii] to verify the stories he has heard of this Jesus of Nazareth. Luke follows through with his gospel, an account of Jesus’ life compiled by his extensive interviews with eyewitnesses.

These reports of authors being eyewitnesses aren’t contained to Matthew and Luke. Two other authors make the same claim: John and Peter. John begins his first letter this way, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life” (1 John 1:1).

In one of his letters, the apostle Peter says, ”For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,’ we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain” (2 Peter 1:16-18).

Peter is referring to a time when he, James, and John were with Jesus and saw the glory of Jesus revealed to them at the Mount of Transfiguration. He’s saying that he was there. He is saying he saw part of Jesus’ divinity revealed. Peter makes a bold claim here. He puts his finger on the most unbelievable part of Jesus’ life and says he was an eyewitness to that event.

It’s hard to deny that the authors who wrote these books intended to talk about a real man's real life.

Just because the authors claim to have written a true history does not, of course, make their telling true. But it is clear that the authors claim to be writing the true history of a real man.

In the next post, we will pick up the question of whether or not it is reasonable to believe the claims of the Bible and consider five additional reasons to believe.

[i] Mark Clark, The Problem of God, 67.

[ii] Paul himself concedes this point that 1 Corinthians 15:17-19.

[iii] Scholars agree that Theophilus was Luke’s patron (he funded Luke in researching and writing the writing of what we now call Luke and Acts (the history of Jesus of Nazareth and the early church). Scholars are split as to whether Theophilus (literally: “lover of God”) was a person or a group of people.