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: An overview of " The new evidence that demands a verdict" a book by josh mcdowell : Is the bible accurate and real? Is jesus god? ; these are questions that can be answered based not only on faith but on supporting scientific and archaeological evidence. Predictions of the future made in the bible 3000 years ago have come true today and none have been disproven. Common sense conclusions can be drawn based on the facts of history as they happened . Don't just take my word for it! purchase and research the bible, purchase and research this book by josh mcdowell. Most people research buying a car or any household product more then they research their eternal destination. If you believe in god and show up at a church , temple or mosque how can you just trust what the priest, pastor or rabbi is telling you. If this priest ,rabbi or pastor was selling you a car, im sure you would look into it more. If you are a believer in god but don't consider yourself active in religion and are satisfied with what you believe, its clear that you need to spend some time to make sure what you believe about god is correct. Think of the possible consequences if your wrong and don't ume there are no consequences. How can you ume anything in life without research, religion can be researched, its not just faith. The purpose of my work is to get you thinking if your following the correct beliefs in reference to god and why not look into it more? When most people are asked why they believe what they do about god they cant justify their beliefs and get upset if you ask them to do so. If you believe in god then your ahead of the game but you most definitely need to know who jesus was and what he said about eternity. This overview helps one to see the truth in the bible based on the supporting evidence available and I hope it stimulates you to research these issues. ( this researcher has only touched on this 760 page book and made some notes on a few of the chapters) : Introduction Chapter: : Christianity is a factual faith - The facts backing the christian claim are not a special kind of religious fact they are the cognitive , informational facts upon which all historical, legal and ordinary decisions are based. : The apostles recorded what they observed and took great measures to make sure it was an orderly and accurate historical narrative. : Josh Mcdowell, a non christian at the time of his research ,like many other researchers wanted to refute the bible but confirmed through years of investigation that the bible is accurate and jesus must be who he claimed to be - the son of god. : In matters of faith it is true that many muslims are more devoted to muhammad and buddhists to buddha then christians are to christ. What you need to understand is it doesn't matter how strong your faith or devotion is , it is who you are devoted to that matters. Those who believe in christ are saved according to the bible. : A common misconception of bible critics is that it is filled with myths. Most justify this belief by comparing it to greek mythology or something similar. Greek mythology is just that a Myth , jesus christ has been proven to of walked this earth in flesh and blood as a historical fact. Similar stories are all based on fictional characters not real people. These events in the bible had numerous eye witnesses who gave testimony and many of the places and people in the bible have been scientifically proven to have existed. : : The Uniqueness of the bible - chapter 1 : 1) The bible is not just a book , it is the ONLY book that was: : A) Written over a fifteen hundred year span. : B) Written by more then 40 authors from every walk of life, including kings , military leaders, peasants, philosophers, fisherman, tax collectors, poets, musicians, statesman, scholars and shepards. : C) Written in different places, the wilderness, a dungeon, a palace, prison, traveling , exile on an island. : D) Written at different times, in war and sacrifice also in peace and prosperity. : E) Written in different moods, joy, sorrow & despair , certainty & conviction , confusion & doubt. : F) Written on three continents , asia , africa and europe. : G) Written in three languages , hebrew , aramatic and greek. : H) Written in a wide variety of literary styles; poetry, historical narrative, song, romance, personal correspondence, memoirs , satire, biography, autobiography, law, prophecy, and parable. : I) It addresses hundreds of controversial topics; marriage, divorce, homouality, adultery, lying, parenting , the nature and revelations of god. : J) In spite of all this diversity , the bible presents a single message- gods redemption of humans. : K) The leading character throughout the entire bible is jesus christ : : 2) The bible is unique in its circulation : A) in 1998 alone 585 MILLION bibles were distributed by the united bible societies . : B) if you lined up 585 million people and handed then a bible every 5 seconds it would take 92 years to distribute that many books which were distributed by one organization in one year. : 3) The bible is unique in translations. : A) The bible has been translated into more then 2,200 languages which is available to 90% of the worlds population : 4) The bible is unique in its survival : A) compared with other ancient writings the bible has more mcript evidence to support it than any ten pieces of clical literature combined : B) It has survived persecution and attempts to make it extinct. Roman Emperors have ordered it destroyed and even current communist countries have attempted to make the bible disappear. : C) Critics have attempted to disprove it and no one has been able to prove anything in the bible false, many critics end up discovering supporting evidence. : 5) The Bible is unique in its teachings - other books claim divine inspiration such as the Koran, Mormon and parts of the Hindu Veda but none of these books contain predictive prophecy : A) Prophecy- hundreds of bible prophecies have been fulfilled being a strong indicator of divine authority : B) History- archaeologists have proven the history written in the bible to be accurate. : C) Character- the bible focuses on reality not fantasy. It presents the good and bad, right and wrong, best and worst, hope and despair, joy and pain of life. : Chapter 2- how we got the bible : This chapter explains how the bible was written, materials used , types of writings and who decided what would go into the bible. This researchers note: some religions cant even trace or prove how they got their religious book. : Chapter 3- Is the new testament historically reliable : A) Many tests have been made and the bible new testament has been proven historically accurate by todays scientific standards : B) An interesting comparison is made on page 38, which compares the mcripts of the new testiment which consists of 5,366 ancient mcripts to other well know ancient books like homer, plato and caesar to name a few. It shows the number of ancient copies available and the time gap from the earliest copies to the date written. The bible has 5366 mcripts available and the other 3 have a total of 660 and of that 660 , 643 are homer. The bible has the shortest time gap of 50-325 years , plato and caesar each are over 1000 years . This researchers opinion is that most critics of the bible will accept and believe what they read of plato, caesar or homer as being accurate and not believe the accuracy of the bible , yet the bible s away the statistics of these other books and is proven accurate. : C) The new testament doents are free of known contradictions. Arguments of contradictions have been disproven by archaeology and science as well as by comparison of biblical record and linguistics. Other contradictions are cleared up simply by reading the entire bible , what seemed a contradiction is made clear at some other point. : D) History has produced many ancient doents from NON christians that confirm the bible as historically accurate like tacitus, suetonius, & josephus to name a few. : E) Archaeology has proven the accuracy of luke , the pool of bethesda, the court where jesus was tried, the nazareth decree, crucifixion victims, the pilate inscription, the erastus inscription, the new testiment coins used (silver money) : Chapter 4- Is the old testament historically reliable : A) similar tests and records as in above are shown here to prove it is. : Chapter 5- Jesus a man of history (note: we keep our dates by jesus's existence in BC & AD) : A) many secular authorities have acknowledged jesus was in fact a person and not a myth. Secular means "pagan" non-christian and non-jewish. These pagans are generally anti-christian and therefor makes them good witnesses since they have nothing to gain by admitting the events surrounding a religious leader which they disdain : B) Tacitus a roman historian , lucian of samosata a greek satirist, suetonius another roman historian, pliny the younger a governor in asia minor, and many other accepted ancient writings by pagans have established that jesus christ died of crucifixion and his followers claim he rose from the dead and was god. : C) Jewish and christian ancient writings have also been discovered supporting the fact jesus was a real person and his followers believed the events as they were doented in the bible. : Chapter 6 - If jesus wasn't god he deserved an oscar. : A) Jesus stated that he was in fact god. This researches note: none of the other major religions prophets make this claim. : B) Jesus Received worship as god and accepted it. : C) Jesus forgave sins : D) Jesus performed miracles & rose from the dead : Chapter 8 - Support of deity : old testament prophecies fulfilled : A) thousands of years before christ was born prophecies were recorded regarding his birth,bloodline, nature, ministry, forerunner, nativity, pion, resurrection, ascension all were fulfilled. : B) This chapter also addresses and disproves the arguments against these prophecies. : Chapter 9- support of diety : the resurrection hoax or history? : A) Jesus has three basic credentials: 1- the impact of his life through his miracles and teachings, upon history . 2- fulfilled prophecy in his life and 3- his resurrection. The resurrection of christ and christianity stand or fall together. : B) Only christianity can claim an empty tomb for its founder. All other religion founders are proven to be dead and buried . Only christianity claims its founder has come back from the dead to be with his followers, Not buddha, Not mohammed or any other religious leader. No other religious leader has predicted his own death to the exact date and method by the hands of another. : C) From a historical approach we know more about the details of the hours immediately before and the actual death of jesus , in and near jerusalem, then we know about the death of any other one man in all the ancient world. : D) Hundreds of eye witness accounts were recorded that jesus was observed alive after he was crucified. By todays legal standards this testimony would be legal proof. ancient non christians have confirmed that these eyewitnesses did in fact state this and the forensic nature of the new testament narratives presents infallible proofs. : E) When jesus was crucified his disciples, who were of all walks of life, denied they knew him and fled in fear , hiding. They knew they also would be put to death . After the claims they had seen jesus risen from the dead they all went forth and preached the gospel knowing they would be killed for doing such. If they did not see jesus then what changed these men to go to their deaths of which they first feared and hid. The disciples had nothing to gain by starting a new false religion , they faced ridicule , hardships, hostility and martyrs deaths. : F) Some people claim christ did not die on the cross. The horror of a crucifixion is described in gory details on page 221 and current medical experts point out how it would be impossible to survive what christ went through. Its also noted that roman soldiers were used to this method of killing and knew when someone was dead, they did this on a regular basis. Before the body of jesus was released pilate sent four executioners to examine christ and verify he was dead which they in fact did. : G) Current medical testimony based on the facts known ,proves that jesus was in fact dead prior to being thrust with the spear. Many people want to claim the spear killed him because his immediate death was almost impossible to have occurred and normally would drag out slowly. Jesus cried out "it is finished" as he died the sky went dark and the ground shook, eye witnesses then believed he was the son of god. Note: This is why people try to refute the actual crucifixion event because if the events happened the way as described in the bible then they also support jesus was who he said he was. : H) The stone in front of the tomb. It was common practice to place these stones in front ,and it would take several men to roll them. In jesus's case the roman government expected an attempted theft of the body so its safe to ume they probably used a stone larger then usual. Three Women were first to find the stone moved and critics say the women moved the stone. It would be physically impossible for three women to move a stone of this weight. If the apostles were going to preform a hoax they would of sent men for a couple reasons, the men could of maybe move the stone as opposed to the women who could not . Remember at this time the apostles were still in hiding in fear of their lives and were not about to go anywhere themselves. At this time in history a womans word was not worthy for testimony, if the apostles planned this hoax and wanted people to believe any statements then they would of sent men not women. : I) The stone was not the only obstacle preventing a hoax. The tomb was sealed and roman soldiers were placed as guards. For anyone to break this seal under roman law was to be punished by death. For a soldier to fall asleep on duty is punishable by death. With all the hype surrounding the death of jesus the guards would be sentencing themselves to death to allow the seal to be broken and would of no way fallen asleep. : J) The tomb was in fact empty. The body of jesus disappeared and it is apparent that the soldiers would not willingly allow that to happen and face death, the disciples were in hiding and in no position to attempt it. Remember the disciples did not understand the old testament prophecies or jesus's own words about rising from the dead on the third day since he called his body "the temple" when he spoke of it being rebuilt in three days. The disciples did not expect this to happen . Even when jesus appeared to them thomas doubted it was him until he touched his wounds. Something unexplainable had happened at the tomb. This researcher sees the only possible explanation as jesus did in fact rise from the dead and the hundreds of eyewitnesses were telling the truth they did in fact see him. A common sense supporting ysis is that the fact christianity actually flourished in and got started right in the city where christ was executed. People would need evidence to believe in a religion that would bring them persecution and that evidence would be the empty tomb and/or eyewitnesses of the resurrected jesus. : K) This chapter briefly touches on the shroud of turin , claimed to be the burial cloth of jesus. Note: there are several television shows and books available to research this piece of evidence. This researchers opinion on the matter after watching several of these investigative shows is that , although not proven false or real, it does have an image that seems unexplainable as to how it was created with energy, it could be that this image was created with an unexplainable energy of christ rising from the dead : This researchers summation: this book has many more interesting topics and gives all sides of the arguments. My overview is very brief and to the point. Being a retired police detective and very familiar with the court system I would say based on the evidence a jury would find that jesus was a real person and not a tale. Jesus was crucified and rose from the dead in physical body not just spirit, therefor he must be who he says he was since no one else has ever been able to accomplish this feat or even claimed to be able to do so. The bible is historically accurate and supported as such by science and archeology. The bible is the only religious book that contains predictive prophecy that is verified and therefor must be of divine inception. All these issues considered I will read the bible and take it very seriously as to the salvation offered by jesus christ , repent of your sins asking forgiveness , believe in christ and live forever with him. : "More Then A Carpenter" a 128 page book by josh mcdowell is more or less an overview of the above book. It also tries to answer the following question asked by many: I will condense the idea; : How can a loving god allow a sinful individual to go to hell.? Simply a reply is , how can a holy,just, righteous god allow a sinful creation in his presence. : People who don't believe in hell or don't understand why people do go to hell, don't understand the nature and character of god. Yes god is forgiving but there is a price to pay. If your child breaks an item in the house , of course you forgive them but you have to pay to replace the item. : Gods solution for payment is jesus christ. God who is plural not singular sent his son jesus to pay the price for our forgiveness, therefor we must accept jesus and ask forgiveness from jesus OR we don't get gods free gift of forgiveness and salvation. The bible makes it clear jesus is the only way to the father. God set the terms and gave us a way, all we have to do is ask for it. Not accepting christ means eternal suffering. : I would like to point out jesus was the son of god, not a creation of god. We are gods creation. There is a major difference and this is an area that you need to research and understand. Jesus was god in the flesh.

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