You know, something we hear all the time is that
Christianity is so narrow -minded. I mean, how
can you say that there's only one God? I mean,
as long as a person is sincere in their belief,
does it really matter? Well, today I want to
tell you, it really does. And I'll tell you why.
Stay with me. Welcome to this edition of Living
on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Our mission is
to inspire Christians to be genuine followers
of Jesus and to empower them to be active disciple
makers in our world. Today, we're continuing
our series, Dealing with Doubts, Reaffirming
Your Personal Faith. Over the next two programs,
Chip will challenge us to think about God in
a different way. That'll cause us to worship
him more intentionally and remind us why we can
trust his promises. But before he dives in, let
me encourage you to use Chip's message notes
while you listen. They include his brief outline
and all the supporting scripture he references.
To download these message notes, go to the broadcasts
tab at livingontheedge .org, app listeners tab,
fill in notes. Well, if you're ready, here's
Chip with his talk, Why I Believe in the God
of the Bible. I was recently walking through
the hallways of our church in between services.
And I mean, it was chaotic. You know, one service
was coming in and another was leaving and people
had their kids and the place was super crowded.
And I was walking, I saw an Asian couple that
were just kind of standing there and I couldn't
tell whether they were lost or needed help with
their child. We're a multicultural church, so
lots of people from all kinds of backgrounds.
And so I just was prompted. I said, excuse me,
can I help you all? Everything okay? And they
said, yeah, actually you can. And then it went
from not their child being in a class to, he
said, you know, my wife and I have been coming
for several months and we're exploring Christianity.
And the place has been very warm here. Our children,
the impact on our kids is really good. And my
wife actually, after the first few months, she
put her faith in Christ. And we were just sitting
here talking because we're on our way back to
Asia and we're going to visit our families. And
we come from a multi, multi generation of Buddhists.
And we want to thank you. We feel like the teaching
has been clear. We feel like it's been intellectually
grounded, that we had no idea about the history
of Christianity and the reasons to believe. And
I'm on the verge of making that commitment. But
he said, the price will be very, very high. Because
when we tell our relatives that we are trusting
in Christ, we're telling them that they are wrong
and past generations are wrong. And I don't know
about you, but there's probably not anything
more unpopular, but more important than asking
and answering the question, is it intellectually
feasible that there is only one true God and
that God is the God of the Bible? You know, we've
talked about a lot of reasons why I believe,
and we've talked about thinking through faith
issues, but this is at the core. And this is
our final time together. So I want you to really
lean back and more than just taking information,
ask yourself, do I really believe? And I want
you to know that I always know there's a mixed
group of people and whether it's small groups
or big groups, I wanna give you a chance before
we end our time that if you have never placed
your faith in Christ, you'll have that opportunity.
But I want you to know why I believe. There's
three... 120 million gods in the world today.
There's 22 major religions, each with a half
million followers or more. So the question you
got to ask is, why do you think the God of the
Bible is the one true God? Now, just so we are
unequivocal, God makes no bones about this. He
writes through the prophet Isaiah, this is what
the Lord says, Israel's King and Redeemer, the
Lord Almighty. I am the first and I am the last.
Apart from me, there is no God. Who then is like
me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and
lay it out before me. God is very, very clear
with Israel. And as we'll learn, Jesus is very,
very clear that there is a narrow road and that
he is the way, he is the truth, he is the life,
and no one comes to the Father except by him.
Now, before we jump into this, there's a couple
big word presuppositions that I need to talk
to you about. Presupposition is an unconscious
set of thoughts or values that are so a part
of the culture and so a part of your life that
you don't even know you believe them, but you
just believe them. But like the foundation of
the house that's underground, everything is upon
it. So we have presuppositions, especially about
religious things and in our culture today. And
I think there's two presuppositions I want to
talk about, get really clear on, and then I will
walk through very systematically the reasons
why I personally believe that the God of the
Bible, the Lord Jesus Christ, is the one true
God. Presupposition number one is that aren't
all religions essentially the same? The answer
is no. Now, if you... kind of listen to pop psychology,
or I was recently on a plane with a fellow from
another country and he lives in the Bay Area.
And we got into discussion about religion and
relationship with God. And he basically said,
well, you know, I know all religions are basically
the same, you know, like this God is on the top
of the mountain and there's many paths and people
go up different paths and they give him many
names. And so this is very, very common, very,
very common. What I can tell you since I've studied
this, if I got a Buddhist, a Taoist, a Mormon,
someone from Islam, someone from Judaism, believe
me, if I got the top seven or eight religions
and got these guys in a room and say, okay, now
line out what you actually believe, do they conflict
at all? Well, the Eastern religions are all impersonal.
God's not even a person. Specific other religions
are dramatic. They would start arguing. What
I can tell you is, You can choose to believe
what you want to believe, but one of the options
is not. All religions are basically the same,
possibly with the exception of Baha 'i. Baha
'i is a sort of interesting religion. I remember
sitting actually next to a lady who was Baha
'i and I asked her what she believed and she
said everything. Well, that conversation went
in amazing ways. But here's what I want you to
know. It's very clear that there's distinctions
between religions in terms of who God is, what
it means to have a relationship with him, what
it requires to have a relationship with him,
and what each of the different religions teach.
The second presupposition is, does it really
matter what a person believes as long as he or
she is sincere and practices those beliefs? These
are so common. The fellow that I was talking
to on the plane, Our discussion first was, well,
they're basically the same. And then he said,
oh, you're probably right. You know, Buddhists
are really different than this. And that group
is really different. But he said, you know, as
long as they're sincere. I mean, this is in the
water system. This is what people unconsciously
believe. And what I want to tell you is that
the answer is no. You can be very, very sincere,
but you can be very sincerely wrong. In fact,
think about this. Imagine if you will, your child
is very sick and you go to the doctor and he
writes a prescription and it's a little bit hard
to read and the pharmacist sincerely fills it
out and he sincerely believes this is the prescription
and gives your child something different. And
your child dies. Being sincere isn't good enough.
Or in our relationships, no one buys that. Imagine
your mate. falls in love with someone else and
says, I'm very sincere. I used to love you. Now
I love them. Is that okay? Or current example,
I will guarantee those in ISIS are absolutely
sincere. They actually believe in their Quran
and the radical version that you are an enemy
and you're an infidel and they are sincerely
killing people thinking they're doing it for
God. But think of this. even in all the world
religions, you know who one of the great heroes
is? It's Jesus. They don't believe he's the son
of God, but Jesus, he's the ideal man. He's the
most loving. He cares for the poor, the marginalized.
We all want to be like Jesus. Would you like
to hear what the most loving person who's ever
walked the earth says? This is the loving Jesus.
Enter through the narrow gate, for wide is the
gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction,
and many enter through it. but small is the gate
and narrow that leads to life and only a few
find it. Jesus is, not was, is the most loving
person in the world. And what he says is it's
not about sincerity. It's about accuracy. Now
we need to be sincere in our love for Christ.
Now here's what I wanna do. And some of this
will be review, but I wanna pretty quickly go
through. These are the reasons why I'm not throwing
my brain in the trash, but that I absolutely
believe the God of the Bible is the one true
God. Reason number one, the historical evidence.
Christianity is subject to objective verification.
It happened in a crucial place, crucial time,
real people, real events in space -time history.
I can verify that. We've already talked about
the actual historical events from archeology,
the trustworthiness of the manuscripts of the
Bible, the evidence from extra biblical sources.
So it's not just what the Bible says about Jesus.
It's what even historians have said. And then
the eyewitness accounts. I mean, in any court
of law, I've been on a number of juries. I don't
know how that works, but I end up on juries.
And I mean, when you have two or three eyewitnesses,
it's a slam dunk. There's 500 eyewitnesses and
it didn't happen out there somewhere. It happened
where it could be verified right in Jerusalem.
The second reason that I believe God of the Bible
is the one true God is the prophetic evidence.
Predictions of specific future events. with 100
% accuracy, confirmed the authenticity. I call
it the Isaiah principle. Follow along as I read
this passage from Isaiah chapter 44, verses 24
to 28. This is what the Lord says, your Redeemer,
who formed you in the womb. I am the Lord, the
maker of all things, who stretched out the heavens,
who spread out the earth by myself, who foils
the signs of false prophets and makes fools of
diviners. Who overthrows the learning of the
wise and turns it into nonsense? Who carries
out the words of his servants and fulfills the
predictions of his messengers? Who says of Jerusalem
it shall be inhabited, of the towns of Judah,
that they shall be rebuilt and all of their ruins?
I will restore them. Who says to the watery deep,
be dry, and I will dry up your streams. Who says
to Cyrus, he is my shepherd and I will accomplish
all that I please. He will say of Jerusalem,
let it be rebuilt. And of the temple, let its
foundations be laid. God is authoritatively saying,
I am the Lord God Almighty, and he makes prophecies
that are very, very specific, that are undeniable,
and that aren't vague. You're listening to Living
on the Edge. We'll get you back to our series
dealing with doubts in just a minute. But first,
if this teaching has ministered to you, consider
becoming a monthly partner. Your regular financial
support goes a long way to help us encourage
pastors, create resources, and share Jesus with
today's youth. Visit livingontheedge .org today
to learn how to support us. Well, with that,
here again is Chip. Now, this is one that I wanted
you to get. Spend a lot of time in one of the
other messages talking about prophecy and the
fulfillment of all the prophecies of Jesus. But
this is 150 years before Cyrus was born. And
Isaiah is getting a clear prophecy from God telling
what's going to happen. 150 years Cyrus the Great
is born. And if you go into this passage very
specifically. All the specific things that God
says this person will do is accomplished and
he names them by name. And in Jewish prophetic
literature, it's quite different than today.
Often people make lots of predictions, you know,
like some are right, some are wrong. Here's the
way it worked with God. A real prophet is right
100 % of the time or he's not one of God's prophet.
And if you claim to be and you're wrong, it's
the capital offense. So what I want you to know
is that my faith is in a God who's sovereign,
who knows the end from the beginning and the
beginning from the end. The third reason I believe
in the God of the Bible is what I just call the
philosophical evidence. The triune nature of
God and the testimony of scripture best answers
life's most timeless and difficult questions.
Now, we could spend years on this one, and this
is an area that was really a part of my coming
to know Christ and really believing what's true.
It's a bit on the metaphysical and the philosophical
side. But let me just highlight three things
that the God of the Bible answers that other
religions don't. Number one, the problem of unity
and diversity. If you look at Egyptian gods,
if you look at Hindu gods, if you look at the
Western gods of the Greeks and the Romans, they
solve the problem of individual gods, diversity.
If you look at the Eastern gods of Buddhism or
reincarnation, what you find is the Easterns,
they solve unity. We're all one, one drop going
back into the ocean. The challenge is the individual
gods competed with one another. The gods of unity
are impersonal and only the triunity of the one
God, three persons and one essence, really answers
the question of how can there be both unity and
diversity in the world? Second is the problem
of evil and justice. Every religion has this
problem. How do you account for the evil and
the suffering and the injustice in the world?
Many religions have a God that has a good side
and a bad side, or there's two gods, or the force,
right? The dark side of the force. It's interesting.
Biblical Christianity answers this, I think,
in the most compelling way. God is a good God
who is perfect, who's made a perfect world. He
gives humankind, mankind freedom. And the world
that we live in is not the world that he desired.
It is our sin that separates and brings what
was called the fall. And now we have a good God
who is sovereign, who gave us freedom to accept
or reject him and that the evil in the world
is a temporary evil that he will actually come.
and die in our place to pay for our sin and then
make all things right. So evil and suffering
has a very clear source and beginning. And there
is a good God who gives us the freedom, but in
essence is willing to love us so much to solve
that very problem. I think the third philosophical
issue is, I would just call it the enigma of
man. I mean, think about this. Mankind is noble.
I mean, our technology, we put a man on the moon.
We have a cell phone for everybody in the world.
Medicine, heart transplants, heart -lung transplants.
Mankind is brilliant, amazing, creative, art,
music. And yet, on the other side, the enigma
is cruelty, hate, jealousy, prejudice, Hitler,
Stalin, the Holocaust. I mean, it's hard to imagine
how the human species could be so beautiful,
so wonderful, so noble, so made in the image
of God, and yet so cruel. The history of mankind
is war after war after war after war. Unmentionable
cruelty and pain and the marginalizing of people
that look different or a different color, hatred
and starvation. How can that happen? The Bible
would say, man is made in the image of God and
so he's noble, but he's a fallen sinful creature
and he needs to be redeemed. The fourth reason
that I believe in the God of the Bible is I'll
just call it the evidence of impact. You know,
every religion has impact. You can go to different
countries and you can know sort of what their
religion has been and you can kind of look around
and say, wow, this is what. is produced after
hundreds of years. I've spent some time in India,
a lot of time in China, time in the Middle East.
I don't know anyone that travels in India for
business that it's heartbreaking. I mean, so
much of India, despite the technology and the
growth in some areas, is the same that has been.
You see, there's a caste system, formal or informal,
and people are getting what they deserve. So
I shouldn't help that person because that's karma.
They're just getting what they deserve. And there
is poverty everywhere. They're fearful of their
ancestors. Limited education except for missionaries
came and began to do the teaching and create
the hospitals that were Christians. See, the
impact of Christianity, when you begin to study
what happened as a result of the teaching of
Jesus, and actually the laws of the Old Testament.
The nation of Israel from one nomad, I mean,
Abraham. You know, he's running around on a camel
somewhere and God chooses him. And from that,
he develops this nation, Abraham, and then Moses,
the laws of Israel. I mean, we don't think about
all those ceremonial laws. Guess what? They didn't
know about germs. The circumcision on the eighth
day, they didn't know that's when the blood clots.
I mean, you think of the laws of hygiene. the
economic laws. Here is a religion that says,
this is what we're gonna do for the poor. Every
seven years, we're gonna reset the dial. Every
50 years, economically, we're gonna reduce things
back to the way it was so you don't have this
super rich and everyone else is poor. I mean,
what the Bible has done and what God has done,
the mustard seed conspiracy, this tiny little
group of people following Jesus that gets birthed,
that changes the world, the liberation of women.
The liberation of slaves, the basis of our jurisprudence,
economic impact, the care for the poor, Wilberforce,
you know, he stood on scripture in England and
stopped. It took decades and stopped the horrendous
slavery that was happening. When you find and
do research, you find that Christians have been
in key areas that have changed the course of
history. This is Living on the Edge with Chip
Ingram, and you've been listening to Part 1 of
Chip's message, Why I Believe in the God of the
Bible, from our series, Dealing with Doubts.
Chip will be back shortly to share some helpful
application for us to think about. Did you know
there's a lot of solid, verifiable evidence that
supports the truth of Scripture and the existence
of Jesus? The real challenge lies in communicating
that proof and the hope of the gospel to those
sincerely seeking answers. So how do we do that?
Well, in this series, Chip and guest teacher
John Dickerson share ways to effectively and
winsomely address honest questions about our
faith that will attract people to the Bible,
not repel them from it. Also, we want you to
have all the necessary tools for those conversations.
So whenever you hear a book, podcast, or article
mentioned in this series, visit livingontheedge
.org and check out our resources page. we want
to point you to relevant, biblically grounded
experts who will equip you to engage with the
doubters and skeptics in your life. Find that
resources page at livingontheedge .org or through
the Chip Ingram app. And before we move on, here's
Chip. I want to pause just for a minute, and
if you're a financial partner with Living on
the Edge, I just want you to hear a message that...
we received from a lady named Kelly who listens
every single day. She said, thanks so much for
your ministry and daily podcast. I listen every
day. I'm a recovering addict of many things.
I grew up in a Christian family and was saved
at the age of 17. Shortly after that, because
of peer pressure in school, started doing drugs.
I now have a few years of sobriety and God saved
my life and he has totally removed the physical
urge to use drugs and alcohol and cigarettes.
I've now joined an awesome church that has small
groups and Christ has blessed me in recovery
meetings. Anyway, thanks so much for sharing
your life with others. You've made a positive
difference in my life. You know, Kelly is one
of hundreds, actually thousands of emails that
we get at Living on the Edge. I just call them
life change. Spirit of God took the Word of God,
and it might have been on a podcast, could have
been on the radio, could have been in a small
group, could have even been a CD or a book. But
God intervenes with their life and something
happens that changes the course of their life.
And I just want to pause and thank you. You know,
some of you write a check every month. Some of
you have it taken out of your account every month.
Some of you like once a quarter, twice a year.
You give to Living on the Edge. I want to remind
you what it actually does. It's not about giving
money. It's about extending ministry and changing
lives. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And
if by chance you're listening and you're thinking,
you know, I've never given to Living on the Edge,
but I'd like to get in on that. We'll give you
a very simple way of how you can join. Join the
team and really make a difference. Thanks, Chip.
Well, if you were inspired by this story, pray
about becoming a financial partner with Living
on the Edge. Your support helps us reach more
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To give a gift, go to livingontheedge .org or
call us at 888 -333 -6003. That's 888 -333 -6003
or go to livingontheedge .org. App listeners
tap donate. Well, here again is Chip to share
a few final words for us to think about. As we
close today's program, I went through what I'd
call four reasons that I have personally come
to of why I believe in the God of the Bible.
The historical, the prophetic, the philosophical,
and then the impact. And I really want to encourage
you as we think through this together. As we
learn how to articulate this to people in our
culture that somehow think that if you disagree
with them that you're narrow or bigoted, the
fact of the matter is that there are some really
sound reasons that are verifiable about why we
believe in the God of the Bible. But here's the
thing for today. In reality, every religion or
truth claim thinks their way is the only way.
The real issue is, what is really true? Let me
just ask you, in light of your study or lack
of it, of other religions or Christianity in
general, or even your family of origin and where
you come from, what choices have you made and
what do you believe, honestly, about the God
of the Bible? Here's what I can tell you and
why this series is so important. it is going
to be more and more challenging, and the cost
of being a follower of Jesus is getting higher
and higher. And so as a follower of Jesus, it's
going to be important for you to know what you
believe and why, and then be able to articulate
that in a kind and winsome way. And I want to
speak to some of you that you might even call
yourself a skeptic and the farthest thing from
a follower of Christ. But as I was speaking,
you said to yourself, almost reluctantly, I should
check this out. I want you to know there is a
God who loves you and who's for you and wants
to reveal himself to you. And could I encourage
you to give us a call or email us and the book,
Why I Believe, it's my personal journey. I've
done the research and I would love to share that
with you. Thanks, Chip. During this series, we've
bundled Chip's Why I Believe book together with
John's book, Jesus Skeptic. We hope that through
these resources, you'll encounter Jesus the God
-man and understand why we can fully trust and
follow the teachings of the Bible. For complete
details about this two -book bundle, call 888
-333 -6003 or go to livingontheedge .org. App
listeners tap special offers. Well, be sure to
join us next time as Chip continues our series
Dealing with Doubts. Until then, I'm Dave Drewy
saying thanks for listening to this edition of
Living on the Edge.