The Bible, also referred to as the Holy Bible, The Word of God, or the Scriptures, was written by some forty earthly authors, spanning a period of about fifteen hundred years.
God Almighty is the Divine author and of whom the Bible declares, “All scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good word” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
Survey after survey reveal that the Bible is the world’s most widely circulated book, and which has been translated in approximately 2,000 languages. The Bible has always been the world’s best-seller with estimates of between 2.5 billion and 5.5 billion copies sold. God says this about His Word, “So shall my word be that goes from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11).
The Bible is the best commentary on itself. For example, 2 Peter 1:20 tells us that “no prophesy of scripture comes from one’s own interpretation.” Meaning, it is not isolated from what the scripture says elsewhere. And, verse 21 says, “For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”
The Bible is uniquely the “Book of books” with sixty-six books, each having its own distinctive theme, yet interconnected with the other books. There are two major “divisions” in the Bible, namely, Old Testament and New Testament. The Old Testament consists of 39 books, originally written in Hebrew and begins with God and His creation of the universe and mankind. The New Testament has 27 books, originally written in Greek and written 400 years after the Old Testament. It begins with the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, His life, ministry, suffering, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension into heaven.
In his commentary titled, “Thru The Bible with J. Vernon McGee,” Bible teacher, author, broadcaster, and pastor the late Dr. J. Vernon McGee wrote the following about the Bible. “It is a God-Book … In the Bible God says twenty-five hundred times, “ God said … the Lord has said … thus saith the Lord,” and so on. God has made very clear that He is speaking through this Book. It is God’s communication to man. The Bible is both Divine and human. This is a Book that communicates; it speaks of mankind today. The Bible is different from any other book because it not only reveals God’s will and purposes but it is the only book that is divinely inspired, meaning it guarantees the revelation of God.” Dr. McGee also quoted from an unknown author who wrote “The Bible contains the mind of God, the state of man, the way of salvation, the doom of sinners and the happiness of believers.”
The Bible declares God to be “A God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is He” (Deuteronomy 32:4). In His prayer to His Father, Jesus said, “Sanctify them through your truth; your word is truth” (John 17:17).
The Scriptures are complete in everything God needed to convey to us; hence, at the end of the Bible, God says, “I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this Book, if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book” (Revelation 22:18).
If there was ever a time God’s Word is today. We are living in a godless, immoral, corrupt, wicked, and evil world. No wonder God has declared: “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick; who can understand it? I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds” (Jeremiah 17:9,10).
This means that the human heart, or man’s innermost being, that is, the true self of a person, is the source of evil, deceit, and sin. This means it cannot be understood or trusted on its own without divine intervention.
For the believer in Christ Jesus; God’s word is absolute truth; we accept and believe it. And that settles it!