"Is Christianity true just because the inerrant Bible says it is? No. Christianity would still be true even if the Bible was never written." -- Dr. Frank Turek
This is the same flawed foundation Andy Stanley tried to lay. The object is not to turn our faith into an academic subject. Faith does not rely upon empirical evidence. The drawing of the Holy Spirit and conversion to a belief in Jesus Christ is not a measurable event. God uses the foolish to confound the wisdom of this age. The things of God are utter foolishness to those who are perishing. It is not the job of any Christian or pastor to convince the unsaved that the Gospel is true. Their job is to preach it. The work of salvation is entirely of God and supernatural. We know the Bible says that only the Gospel can save someone and that only God gives that increase. So we are not off to a good start here.
"Let me explain. It's a common belief prevalent among some Christians today that what we know about Christianity depends on an inerrant Bible. Sure, we know that there are several non-Christian writers from the ancient world who make brief references to the first-century events and the beliefs of the early Christians, corroborating what we read in the New Testament. We also know that there is an increasing number of archaeological findings that support characters and events in the Christian storyline. But some of us erroneously think that Christian beliefs cannot be sustained unless the Bible is without error. That would mean that the Christian faith is a house of cards ready to collapse if one verse or reference in the New Testament is discovered to be false." -- Dr. Frank Turek
The reference to the house of cards analogy is actually what Andy Stanley said in one of his sermons and it was wrong then and it is wrong today. True faith is the opposite of a house of cards. True faith can look at what carnal excuses the world makes and see through them because we believe in the inerrancy of Scripture. We do not need archeological finds and first century events. Sure it is always nice to hear that the world admits something we believe has somehow been proven but faith already knew it was proven. Turek has it backwards. I do not have faith because I believe the Bible is inerrant. I believe the Bible is inerrant because I have faith. Let's break it down real simple. The key verses today express that all Scripture is God-breathed. This is what is known as divine inspiration. This means that God Himself breathed out the words we see on paper in the Bible. It was not Paul, Peter, or John but God. Is God like a man that he would lie? Is there anything He has said He was going to do that He did not? Does He change His mind? Is He capricious? No beloved. No.
"Although I think are good reasons to believe in an inerrant Bible, inerrancy is an unnecessarily high standard by which to establish the central event in Christianity--the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth (which we celebrated this Sunday). Christianity hinges on that historical event. If Christ rose from the dead, then, game over, Christianity is true. On the other hand, if he didn't rise from the dead, then, as a first-century eyewitness by the name of Paul admitted, Christianity is false. But you don't need inerrant sources to establish that the resurrection actually happened, or any other historical event for that matter. For example, if you found an error in the stat line of a football game, should you assume that every game, story and stat line in the newspaper was a complete fabrication? Then why do some people do that with the New Testament? Why do they assume that unless every word of it is true, then most of it is false?" -- Dr. Frank Turek
