For several days now, a particular song has kept coming to my mind. “No More Night” by Walter S. Harrah, sung by David Phelps, is about the future home of believers in Jesus. Following is the first part of this inspiring song:
“The timeless theme, Earth and Heaven will pass away. It’s not a dream, God will make all things new that day. Gone is the curse from which I stumbled and fell. Evil is banished to eternal hell. No more night, no more pain. No more tears, never crying again. And praises to the Great I Am. We will live in the light of the risen Lamb.”
Unfortunately, there are many who went to church all their lives growing up who do not realize the truth of the things they were told when they were children. They doubt or flat out disbelieve the truth of the words of that song. Why? They have never come to an understanding of why they should believe the Bible is true and how we can depend on it to give us basic instructions before leaving Earth.
There are three strong examples of proof of the Bible being the Word of God. The first is fulfilled prophecy. In Luke 24 we are told that Jesus explained the prophecies and depictions of Himself throughout the Old Testament to the two disciples He met on the road to Emmaus. You may read the first prophecy He would have told found in Genesis 3:15. Later in Genesis, we discover that Joseph, the favorite son of Jacob, is a perfect “type of Christ,” with many correlations to the life of that coming Messiah, Jesus Christ.
Psalm 22, written hundreds of years before the Roman Empire, in which was invented the method of execution called crucifixion, foretells how the Messiah would suffer the piercing of His hands and feet (verse 16), and how “they part My garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture,” which also happened on Mt. Calvary many years later. Isaiah 53 describes the results of the crucifixion of this promised One, given by a loving God to take away the sins of the world. In recent days, Christian witnesses will read Isaiah 53 to a Jew, and the listener will sometimes say they think that passage must be from the New Testament, telling about what happened to Jesus. They are shocked when they discover it is in their Tanakh, or our Old Testament. It is a prophecy of the Messiah, fulfilled by Jesus and recorded in the New Testament in the Bible. (Jews have always been told Jesus was a fraud and their Messiah is still to come.)
God helps us in our skepticism. The second of the primary proofs of the veracity of the Bible to which I refer is that of discoveries of archaeologists. This practice is very modern and contemporary, with many evidences being found in only the last hundred to two hundred years. Before that time, there were many things mentioned in the Bible that were denied by sceptics as being real, such as the Hittite people found prominently there. But in 1906, Hugo Winckler found a royal archive with 10,000 tablets, confirming the existence of this great ancient civilization. King David was doubted, but in 1906 was found at Tel Dan, an archaeological site, a “stele” or monument with the name of King David inscribed upon it. This has been hailed as the first solid, secular proof of his existence. There was also the “Pilate inscription” found in 1961.
II Chronicles 32:30 tells of a tunnel built by King Hezekiah in ancient times. This has been found. Verse one of that same chapter mentions Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and his war with Judah. The Taylor prism, on which this king recorded the annals of his military campaigns, verify his invasion chronicled in the Bible. We know that King Cyrus, important in the Bible as the one who helped the Jews return to Israel after the Babylonian captivity, existed because of the “Cyrus cylinder,” now kept in the British Museum. These are just several examples.
The last, and the most important, proof of the truth that the Bible is the Word of the living God, the only God, Creator of the universe, is the millions of changed lives through the power of His grace and people’s faith in response to that grace. I know, though I was just a young child when I received Jesus as my Saviour, that it did change my life. Experiencing great joy that I still remember, I began singing praises to Him immediately that day, began trying to get my friend to accept Jesus the next. He has been my Shepherd, my Friend, my Healer, my Deliverer, my Refuge, and everything else I have ever needed. He has led me through all kinds of relationships and situations, and He has taken away many sins, sicknesses, and sorrows, even while I still live in this life.
In recent years, I have heard many times of people in the Middle East, where it is dangerous to be a Christian, who have had dreams and visions of Jesus, which led them to read a Bible or seek to find a Christian, to learn the gospel and become a child of the true God. Many thousands of Christian believers in other countries have been persecuted and have willingly given their lives for the sake of sharing the gospel with their fellow citizens.
by L. Agnes Russell
One does not have to look far to find people around you willing to testify as to how the gospel of Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit have changed their lives, many times from degradation and desperation to that of godliness and hope. On television programs, in church services, and on YouTube, there are many testimonies of people on this continent who have been saved from lives of crime, addictions, and other hopeless situations. People who come out of those lifestyles often live out the rest of their lives sharing Christ, serving others, and advancing the Kingdom of God.
After Thomas, Jesus’s disciple, had declared that he would not believe on the risen Christ unless he could see the physical evidence, when Jesus appeared unto the group with Thomas there, Jesus told him, “Do not disbelieve, but believe…Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” (John 20:27) Thomas exclaimed, “My Lord and my God!” The gospel of John ends in verse 31, “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through His name.” We must be like the early disciples and many thousands since, who have been willing to give up their lives to the persecutors, because of their faith in Jesus Christ. They could give glory to God, knowing they were going to a place of no more night, pain or death!
Live for Jesus! He’s coming soon! You may contact me at lagnesrussell@gmail.com or 601-635-3282.
