What Is the Bible? Words to Live By: Faith Art Print

Words to Live By: Faith Art Print
DeWitt, Debbie
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Faith... is being sure of what you hope for and certain of what you do not see - Hebrews 11:1

If this is true, there is real point to asking once more: "Just what is the Bible anyway? Why does it continue to make this kind of impact? Why do people keep being transformed by it?" Let's try to find out.

If you were handed a Bible for the first time in your life, and given a couple of hours to jot down some impressions, you might end up with a list like this:

a VERY long book two main divisions (O.T. and N.T. -- what do these terms mean?) actually not one book, but many books (66 on actual count) some books very long, others less than a page all sorts and kinds: history short stories a play a love poem philosophy law codes informal letters some which baffle me completely seems to be mainly about the Jeuish people and later on one of them in particular (Jesus)

If you did a little digging into the history of the book itself, you would come up with a few further facts:

book a long time being written-about 1,000 years first part written in Hebrew, second part in Greek, couple of dashes of Aramaic (what's that?) parts of it since translated into OVER 1,000 LANGUAGES!! latest translation (into English) called "biggest publishing venture in history"

Of course, such information doesn't begin to answer the question, What is the Bible? But if you kept at it, you'd finally come up with something like the next few paragraphs.

It wouldn't be enough to say that the Bible is the record of man's search for God, a report on the slow, agonizing, upward quest from primitive origins to a highly developed monotheism (belief in one God). True, there are many examples of the development of the concept of God as it becomes purified and ennobled in the course of Jewish history. But as a means of understanding the Bible, this isn't enough. It is much closer to the truth to say that the Bible is the record of God's search for man. Throughout the Bible people seem bent on trying to escape from God. And in spite of this, God continues to seek after those same people, refusing to give up, continuing the pursuit in spite of countless rebuffs and evasions.

It has all the excitement and thrill of a detective story, in which the detective relentlessly chases the criminal through chapter after chapter. The same kind of relentless pursuit dominates the interpretation that the Jewish people put on their historical past, in the Old Testament. The search culminates in the New Testament, where the claim is made that God has so desired fellowship with man that finally he has not just sent emissaries or ambassadors or prophets or representatives-in Jesus Chirist he has come himself! It is the most astounding word that has ever been spoken. It is the most stupendous claim that has ever been made. If anything is "unexpected news," this is.