‘The Bible! Why, that old book, nobody can prove it.’ Alan and I were standing in line at B&Q, which is a huge DIY store in England. We had been chatting to the elderly couple behind us and we had mentioned the word ‘Bible’. The man immediately jumped on it, and practically spat the word from his mouth. ‘Actually we CAN prove it,’ Alan said.
Unfortunately the short conversation which ensued was not fruitful. The couple did not want to know. Their minds were made up. We were casting pearls before swine. There they were, most of their lives behind them, eternity before them, and they were quick to reject most vigorously the book that could open their eyes and bring them to a real knowledge of God, the book which could save them from an eternity in Hell and guarantee them entrance into Heaven.
Can we really prove that the Bible is true, that it is God’s book? Yes of course! The No.1 best proof is prophecy. The Bible contains hundreds of prophecies, and many have come to pass exactly as prophesied. It is the only such book in the world. Forget Nostradamus, who Alan always calls Nostra Nonsense. He was an occultist and his work is of no value whatsoever.
The prophecies of the Bible, on the other hand, are astonishing and without parallel in all of literature. They start in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, and build to a crescendo in the Book of Revelation. They deal with many things – most importantly the coming of the Messiah, the man who is also God. They also deal with the fate of individual people, kings, battles, nations. Some have been literally fulfilled, precisely as prophesied. Many are yet to be fulfilled, and my goodness, how we can see the fulfilments lining up today!
Christians all over the world who look into these matters are getting excited, folks! I visited a lady aged 88 recently and she greeted me with: ‘Oh, Pat, have you read Isaiah 19? Do you know what is going on in Egypt?’ She was excited. She knows the Lord Jesus is coming back soon, and she is ready and waiting. She has actually paid for her funeral and arranged the service with her church, but she is really hoping to go in the Rapture and meet the Lord in the air (as per 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18).
Prophecy is no problem for God. He is outside time. He knows the end from the beginning. And He has put the fate of this world in His book. Individual nations are named and shamed and their destinies are described. One of the best books delving into all this is Dr Arnold Fruchtenbaum's 'Footsteps of the Messiah'.
There are many other proofs that the Bible is God's Word. We talk about this in our books. One is archeology. The so-called 'higher critics' of the 18th century destroyed the faith of many with their scoffing at the Bible, but one by one their scoffing accusations have been shown to be lies. For instance, they said there was no such place as Nineveh, so the Bible was rubbish because Jonah the prophet went to Nineveh. Wrong, guys. Nineveh has since been unearthed. It was destroyed just as Jonah prophesied. Did you apologize for your crass stupidity? No.
The higher critics said there was no such king as Sargon, so the Bible was just rubbish. Well, go to the British Museum. They have an artifact which mentions Sargon. Did the critics grovel in apologies? No. And there are many other such things.
My definition of 'higher critics' - deluded people who think they know better than God and try to prevent anyone from knowing Him. Higher? No, they are the lowest of the low.
Also, the Bible makes perfect sense of the world, the universe and all of history. After all, it only goes back about six thousand years, or hadn't you noticed? We haven't found any structures that are, say, 150,000 years old have we?
The Bible makes perfect sense of creation, fossils, the topography of the land etc. It tells us how God created everything (by speaking it into existence), and how He destroyed the old world with the Flood. This makes perfect scientific sense and explains the millions of fossils and the 'extinction event' scientists talk about.
It makes perfect sense of life itself, since we now know about DNA, an information system which could never have just come about by time and chance (evolution).
As a former sceptic and scoffer myself, I know how easy it is to brush off the Bible. It seems the smart and sophisticated thing to do. Now it is my greatest joy to know its truths and, best of all, to know its Author! Yes, you can actually KNOW God Almighty, God Himself, through Jesus, God who became a man so that we could have our sins forgiven, so that the door to Heaven could be open to all who put their faith in Jesus and His sacrifice for our sins on the cross of Calvary.
Happy day, oh happy day, when the Lord Jesus came my way. Happy day, oh happy day, when Jesus washed my sins away!
He can wash your sins away too, dear reader, if you will trust in Him and open your heart to Him. There is no other way you can ever be forgiven, no other way the slate can ever be wiped clean, no other doorway to God, no other entrance ticket into Heaven. Your good works are not good enough; your life does not measure up to God’s standard – no one’s does! Only one life ever did, and that Person, the only one who ever measured up, was nailed to a cross and willingly gave Himself as a sacrifice for our horrible sins. He shed every drop of His holy blood so that we could be forgiven – IF we accept that sacrifice on our behalf.
‘But that’s horrible,’ you might say. ‘Why should blood have to be shed for sins to be forgiven? Why can’t God just forgive us all without all that stuff about blood?’ Well that is the way it is, folks. Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. This is God’s universe. He made it and that is the way it is. Sin is so terrible, so completely awful, repellent and ugly, that it has a terrible penalty. There is such a thing as justice, a concept we only know because God has put it into us, programmed us to know right from wrong.
God’s sense of justice is horribly offended when we sin. On earth when people commit crimes, there is punishment, or should be. When people are just let off after committing murder, theft or something else, our sense of justice is offended. This happens all the time today, because our societies have pushed God out.
But God has made a way that His own justice has already been satisfied. The blood penalty against mankind’s many sins has been totally and finally paid by Jesus Christ, who suffered as the sacrificial Lamb of God.
Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.
With the shedding of Jesus’ blood there is complete forgiveness available for every sin.
This is the wonder of the ages! It is the offer of free and total forgiveness if you accept Jesus as your Savior. But if you turn away, reject Him, and spurn the fact that He died in your place…you have missed it, your sins are on your own head instead of on His thorn-crowned head. You will be thrown into Hell with all others who think they are good enough without Jesus.
God the Father doesn’t want you to go to Hell; He does not want anyone to perish - that is why He sent His Son, Jesus. Jesus doesn’t want you to go to Hell; that is why He willingly agreed to leave His equality with the Father and become a man to suffer and die for you and me. The Holy Spirit does not want you to go to Hell; that is why He is doing everything possible to draw men to the Savior now, convicting them of their sins, of Jesus’ righteousness, and of the coming terrible judgement.
The entire Godhead does not want you to go to Hell! Jesus died to save you. The Father is trying to draw you to Him. The Holy Spirit is trying to convict you, to make you realize that you are a sinner and need forgiveness of sins.
But God gave you free will! It is up to you to accept Jesus’ great sacrifice. Won’t you do that today?
A prayer: Lord Jesus, I understand that sin is so terrible that only blood can pay the penalty. And I understand that You shed Your holy blood so that my sins can be forgiven. I accept Your sacrifice of Yourself on the cross of Calvary as the payment to satisfy God’s justice for all my sins. Please forgive my sins now, Lord Jesus, and cleanse me. Please make me one of Your people.
Alan adds: A great wealth of information about end times, prophecy and the truth of Scripture is in our two books that are currently available from our web shop: Goodbye America, Goodbye Britain and Cults and Isms: True or False? When I pick them up and read them after not looking at them for a while I am reminded of how much we have packed between the covers: vital infomation which most Christians don't have a clue about. Like- what defines a cult and how is it that saying you are a Christian doesn't make you one?
What we have done in both books is to let Scripture validate itself and confound the sceptics and scoffers - the people the Bible itself predicts will be expelling their hot air in the end times, which we are clearly in. There are also a number of DVDs of talks I have given at churches and conferences in Britain and America and all are packed with information difficult to find elsewhere. You certainly WON'T get it in many "Christian" bookstores, stuffed as most of them are with terrible rubbish written by shysters and money preachers. The big name folk from "Christian TV" who fly the world in their private jets. They make the Lord sick.
I am available to speak at churches and conferences in America and Great Britain. I am starting to plan for 2014. This year I spoke at two prophecy conferences in Dallas and another in Columbus, Ohio, and the film of one presentation, from Dave Reagan's prophecy conference in Dallas in June, will shortly be seen on Daystar. Watch Christ in Prophecy to see it: the program is on in the UK at 4 am on Thursdays and is the best thing on TV, as you will see if you set your Sky box to record it. My theme was The EU: The Revived Roman Empire. If you want to know where Antichrist will spring from, this presentation explains all.
If you would like me to give Powerpoint presentations to wake up the sleeping church- and better inform the wideawake one- contact me at alan@thefreepressonline.co.uk I can be speaking in your neighborhood if I get plenty of advance notice.
