Believe, part 2

Tonight, we are continuing to look at “believe”.
As people, we believe a lot of things and not all the things we believe in are true or real.
People once believed that the earth was flat.
We now know that belief was false.
When cars were first created, some people believed that if you went over 60 miles an hour, you would die.
We know that belief was wrong as well.
And there are some things that we say we believe that we believe in word only.
One of the definitions of the word “believe” is to have a strong convection of.
Now, there are a lot of things that sound believable, but do we have that kind of conviction in what we say we believe?
Last week we started with God and the evidence that God exists.
Evidence of God is found in nature, in science, and in logic.
The fact that life exists at all is a testament to some kind of intelligent creator, and we know that creator to be God.
Tonight, we are going to shift our focus to His word, the Bible.
Is it true? Is it trustworthy?
What do you believe?
If you believe that the Bible is true, it should be making a difference in your life.
In the truths in the Bible should be finding their way into your everyday life.
Like what the Bible says on lying, cheating, gossiping, etc.
The Bible gives us a picture of the heart of God.
It shows us who He is and His designs for this life.
It's easy for us to say that the Bible is true, but do we have proof?
It's also easy for someone to say, "The Bible is not true" or "It's full of errors", but do they have proof.
Check out this amazing discoveries from Archaeology that give us proof of the truth of the Bible.
1.) Ebla Kingdom Proofs : Northern Syria"Documentary Hypothesis" advocates have claimed that the time of Moses' writing of the first 5 books of the Bible was before any knowledge of writing and therefore erroneous. However the discovery of the Ebla tablets shows that writing existed 1000 years before Moses' time.
2.) The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which date from 200 B.C. to A.D. 68, included a copy of every Old Testament book except for one. Comparison with the texts of a thousand years later shows little or no variation and change between them.
3.) Jerico was found and excavated. Upon examining the ruins it was obvious that : "there remains no doubt : the walls fell outwards so completely that the attackers would be able to clamber up and over the ruins into the city." This is very unusual and because the wall of cities fall inwards not outwards during conflicts. This exactly verifies the account of Jerico in the Bible.( Joshua Chp. 6)
4.) Critics used to say that the biblical description of the Hittite Empire was wrong because the Hittite Empire (they thought) didn't even exist! Then archaeologists discovered the Hittite capital in 1906 and discovered that the Hittite's were actually a very vast and prominent civilization.
5.) For the New Testament, Dr. G.R. Habermas points out that within 110 years of Christ's crucifixion, approximately eighteen non-Christian sources mention more than "one hundred facts, beliefs, and teachings from the life of Christ and early Christendom. These items, I might add, mention almost every major detail of Jesus' life, including miracles, the Resurrection, and His claims to deity."
6.) The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which date from 200 B.C. to A.D. 68, included a copy of every Old Testament book except for one. Comparison with the texts of a thousand years later shows little or no variation and change between them.

This is just a very small lists of how true the Bible really is.
People who say the Bible isn't true, just haven't put it to the test.
Look at the facts, what do you believe?

Believe, Part 1

Tonight, we begin our focus on “Believe”.

I’ve been talking about this to you for a while and it’s been kind of a mystery.

But as we look at this together, God is going to bring this mystery together.

And as the next several weeks play out, we are going to get a sense of who God is and who we really are.

As we look at this idea of believe, we realize that there are things that we all believe.

For example, most people believe that murder is wrong, drugs are bad, and that life has a beginning.

But what we believe is not always as cut and dry as that.

For example, we may believe that murder is wrong, but most of us also believe that it is okay to kill someone if you are protecting your or someone else’s life.

We may agree that drugs are bad, but we may believe that it is okay to allow terminally ill patients the right to use narcotics to ease their sufferings.

We may believe that life has a beginning, but we have a variety of avenues to follow on how we believe everything began.

Was it God, was it evolution, was it some random chance?

Although we may have similar beliefs, it’s those intricate details of what we believe that really define who we are.

Tonight, we are beginning a journey to discover what we believe and how that belief should define our entire lives.

Part of believing in something is knowing what that something is about.

You can believe that the sky is blue, but you can’t totally be sure of that belief until you have examined it and understand what makes it blue.

We can believe that God is real, but until we examine Him and seek to understand Him, our belief in Him will be minimal at best.

Matthew 22:37

Here, Christ tells us that we are to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul, and for us to do that, we have to have an understanding of Him.

It’s a progression of moving from knowing and loving God with our heart, to discovering Him and the truth of who He is with our mind, to letting Him and His will control our lives.

That’s what believe is all about.

As we begin, we have to start with God.

Is God real, how can we know?

What do we believe about God, why do we believe it?

What proofs do we have?

Let's look at a few proofs we have in nature:

The Earth...its size is perfect. The Earth's size and corresponding gravity holds a thin layer of mostly nitrogen and oxygen gases, only extending about 50 miles above the Earth's surface. If Earth were smaller, an atmosphere would be impossible, like the planet Mercury. If Earth were larger, its atmosphere would contain free hydrogen, like Jupiter. Earth is the only known planet equipped with an atmosphere of the right mixture of gases to sustain plant, animal and human life.

The Earth is located the right distance from the sun. Consider the temperature swings we encounter, roughly -30 degrees to +120 degrees. If the Earth were any further away from the sun, we would all freeze. Any closer and we would burn up. Even a fractional variance in the Earth's position to the sun would make life on Earth impossible.

The Universe...Scientists are convinced that our universe began with one enormous explosion of energy and light, which we now call the Big Bang. This was the singular start to everything that exists: the beginning of the universe, the start of space, and even the initial start of time itself.Astrophysicist Robert Jastrow, a self-described agnostic, stated, "The seed of everything that has happened in the Universe was planted in that first instant; every star, every planet and every living creature in the Universe came into being as a result of events that were set in motion in the moment of the cosmic explosion...The Universe flashed into being, and we cannot find out what caused that to happen."

Laws of Nature...Much of life may seem uncertain, but look at what we can count on day after day: gravity remains consistent, a hot cup of coffee left on a counter will get cold, the earth rotates in the same 24 hours, and the speed of light doesn't change -- on earth or in galaxies far from us.
How is it that we can identify laws of nature that never change? Why is the universe so orderly, so reliable?
"The greatest scientists have been struck by how strange this is. There is no logical necessity for a universe that obeys rules, let alone one that abides by the rules of mathematics. This astonishment springs from the recognition that the universe doesn't have to behave this way. It is easy to imagine a universe in which conditions change unpredictably from instant to instant, or even a universe in which things pop in and out of existence."
Richard Feynman, a Nobel Prize winner for quantum electrodynamics, said, "Why nature is mathematical is a mystery...The fact that there are rules at all is a kind of miracle."

We also have proof of Christ in the lives of the disciples. No one willingly dies for a lie. These early followers of Christ gave up their lives for what they knew was true. The Bible claims that after Christ rose from the dead, over 500 people saw Him alive.

The proofs are there, the question is what are you going to believe.

Join us next Wednesday night or check this post to discover more of who God is and who you really are.

Believe.