30 Days - an Overview of the Bible in Just Thirty Daysනියැදිය

Welcome to 30 Days! This series was created as a Bible exploration tool for those who are new to Christianity, interested in knowing more, or simply looking for a fresh perspective. Watch the video for a quick intro or skip straight to the devotional content below.

How can you know that Christianity is true?

For much of my life, I wasn’t a Christian, in fact I was quite an argumentative atheist, and I was very suspicious of Christians.

In my first year at university I had a room next door to my great friend Nicky Lee, and I warned him against these Christians. I said, ‘Don’t let them into your room, whatever you do!’

But it was too late – he’d met some. And one time he and his then girlfriend, now his wife Sila came back and they said that they had become Christians. I was horrified. I thought, ‘How can I help them?’ I really didn’t know anything about it, so I thought I’d better investigate to prove that it’s not true.

So I managed to find this old Bible, and that night I started reading it. I read Matthew’s Gospel; Mark; Luke; I got about halfway through John’s Gospel. About three in the morning, I fell asleep.

The following day I carried on reading. All that day, all the next day, all the day afterwards.

But when I got to the end of the New Testament, I came to the conclusion, it’s true!

John 5:31 - 5:47

How can you know that Christianity is true? Jesus made astonishing claims. Earlier on in John Chapter 5 in verse 18, we read that Jesus ‘was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God’, but in our passage today, Jesus says his own testimony is not enough. Supporting evidence is required. God the Father has supplied this evidence through at least four witnesses.

1. The evidence of other people

John the Baptist had provided supporting evidence. Earlier in the apostle John’s Gospel, the author tells us: ‘there came a man who was sent from God; his name was John [the Baptist]. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light… He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light’.

Today there are 2.6 billion Christians all over the world, more than ever before, who follow Jesus Christ. They come from every race, class and background and they say that Jesus has changed their lives, that he is the ‘Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world’.

2. The evidence of the life’s work of Jesus

Jesus says that ‘the very work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me’. This evidence Jesus describes as ‘weightier than that of John [the Baptist]’. Jesus is, as a former Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple put it, referring to ‘the whole activity of the Word made flesh.’ Jesus’ life’s work includes his miracles, which were openly acknowledged to have happened at the time although some simply attributed them to demonic powers. The evidence also includes his way of life, his attitude to other people, the effect of his teaching, his influence on those who met him and, supremely, his death. Jesus said the purpose for which he was sent by the Father was to die for us (v.36). When it was completed, he cried out, ‘It is finished’.

3. The evidence of the Father’s direct testimony

There was the outward voice that testified directly at Jesus’ baptism, declaring ‘You are my Son, whom I love’. Then, there were the inner words of the Father, who speaks to our hearts and consciences. But the supreme way in the New Testament that the Father directly testifies is by raising Jesus from the dead.

4. The evidence of the Scriptures

For me, it was through reading the New Testament that it was as if the person of Jesus emerged from the pages and I encountered him.

Jesus says, ‘The Scriptures… testify about me’. The whole Old Testament reflects Jesus – ‘Moses… wrote about me’. As the church reformer Martin Luther put it: ‘every word rings of Christ’. There are more than 300 prophecies about him including the virgin birth, the place of his birth, the manner of his death (in great detail) and the place of his burial.

It is possible to read the Bible and miss the whole point. Some of the people at the time did that. They diligently studied the Scriptures but life was not to be found in the book. The book is the witness that points to Jesus. Life is in Jesus. As someone has put it, ‘What is in the old [Testament] concealed is in the new [Testament] revealed.’

So, in light of all this evidence, why do people still refuse to come to Jesus Christ?

• Some are not willing to put God first in their lives

They are not willing to obey the first command to love God above everything else –to give up everything that they know is wrong in their lives and put God first.

• Some are more concerned about what others think than about what God thinks

There may be a stigma attached to being known as a Christian and associated with other Christians, but Jesus died publicly for us, and we should not be ashamed to be known publicly as his followers.

• Some simply refuse to believe in Jesus, in spite of the evidence

Many people still believe that faith is irrational, but it is not belief in Jesus that is irrational but unbelief; it is irrational not to believe in the face of overwhelming evidence.

And when I looked at the evidence, when I read the New Testament, I came to the conclusion it is true! I didn’t want to become a Christian, because I thought if I became a Christian life would be totally miserable from that moment onwards. So I tried to put it off. I thought, ‘I’ll put off becoming a Christian till my deathbed.’

And then I realised that would not be intellectually honest.

So, very reluctantly, I kind of said: ‘Okay, yes.’

And at that moment – I can still remember that moment so clearly – it dropped from my head, being convinced it was true, to my heart, having an experience of a relationship with Jesus.

Prayer

Lord, thank you that you have not left us without evidence and that my faith is based on good historical grounds. As I study the Scriptures, may my heart burn within me as I encounter a relationship with the risen Jesus.

References

© Nicky Gumbel, 2024

This reading plan is adapted from the book 30 Days by Nicky Gumbel. It is published by Hodder and Stoughton in the UK, and by HarperCollins Christian Publishing in the USA.