Windmill Ministries - Newsletter - Spring 2009

Welcome to Windmill Ministries' Spring 2008 newsletter, our regular update about our Christian evidences ministry, recent apologetic discoveries, answers to asked questions, books, an inspirational story or poem and so on.

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that you have.  (1 Peter 3:15)

Apologetics: 12 Evidences for the Truth of the Bible

1. The Dead Sea Scrolls: These contain Old Testament manuscripts from 100 years before the birth of Christ, proving that over the centuries the scriptures were very carefully copied and our current texts are close to identical to the original texts.
2. The Septuagint: The first translation from the Hebrew Old Testament to the Greek language, dated from the 285-270 BC timeframe. The Septuagint proves the existence of all the Old books before 300 BC.
3. The canon of the Old Testament: The list of books that now makes up our Old Testament was never under serious dispute, showing these books were accepted, and treated as God’s word almost immediately after they were written.
4. Authorship and dating of the Old Testament: Although most of the Old Testament books are technically anonymous, we have strong internal and external evidences to support the traditional authorship and date of writing for these books.
5. The manuscripts of the New Testament: The abundance (over 25,000 partial and complete texts) and early dating (the earliest papyrus is from 125 AD) of preserved manuscripts of the New Testament shows the reliable preservation of the original texts.
6. Testimony of the Early Church leaders: Additionally there exist over 86,000 quotations from the New Testament texts in the preserved writings of the leaders of the Early Christian church, testifying to the original texts.
7. The canon of the New Testament: The official canon of the New Testament was agreed upon by 397 AD, however, before the year 150 AD, all gospels, Acts and Paul’s epistles were universally accepted as part of the list of Inspired writings. The disagreements in the 3rd and 4th century only centered around a few of the smaller New Testament books: James, 2 Peter, 2&3 John, Jude and Revelation.
8. Authorship and dating of the Gospels: Although technically anonymous, there are strong internal and external evidences that support the authorship of the gospels by the names we identify them by today. Mark is generally considered to be the oldest gospel; even liberal scholars will agree on a dating before 70 AD, although more realistic is in the 55-65 timeframe. Luke, Mark and Acts are generally dated in the 60-80 timeframe. The gospel of John is now universally accepted to be written in the 80-90 period.
9. Authorship and dating of Paul’s letters: All substantial letters are universally accepted to be written by the apostle Paul in the 49-65 AD timeframe. That makes these letters likely the earliest written documents in the New Testament.
10. The ‘lost’ books of the Bible were never ‘lost’: Modern liberal scholars claim recently discovered ‘lost’ or ‘deliberately misplaced’ gospels that claim alternative views on Jesus and His teachings. Famous examples are the ‘gospel of Thomas’, the ‘gospel of Judas’ and the ‘gospel of Mary Magdalene’ (one of the ‘sources’ for the claims of the Da Vinci code). However evidence shows that these gospels were not only written generations after the apostles, but also that the preserved texts were subject to ‘creative editing’ (rewriting) by Gnostic heretic sources.
11. The historical reliability of the Bible: Archeology and historical analysis again and again show the accuracy of the events, locations and customs mentioned in the Bible accounts. Never has anybody been able to disprove any of the accounts.
12. The credibility of the eye-witnesses: The eye-witness accounts to Jesus prove to be honest and factual testimonies. The abundance of (irrelevant) detail, consistency of the accounts, as well as between the different gospels, lack of exaggeration and confirmations from extra-Biblical sources prove their credibility.

Obedience versus Legalism

For more articles like this see our resource center

Is following the instructions and teachings of the Bible, especially on politically incorrect topics, legalism or obedience? Do we need to read God’s Word as a suggestion or a command?

Modern culture clashes at many points with the Bible. Biblical teachings about the submission of a wife to her husband; permitting men only in the roles of elders, deacons, teachers and pastors; marriage between a man and a woman; the sanctity of life versus abortion and euthanasia; head coverings and so on, are all more or less in conflict with our – secular – world and modern way of life. Many will claim these teachings were “from and for a different time” and are no longer applicable. Christians who seek to obey these commands are often called legalists.

However what is legalism? A legalist believes that one can be saved by keeping all God’s commands to the letter. Basically, he believes he can live without sin, without breaking God’s Law. Therefore, he does not need Christ, as he is without sin. This attitude of “self-righteousness” resulting in a feeling of superiority was what Jesus convicted and condemned in the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law. We know we all sin. Anyone who reads the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) will realize that it is not humanly possible to keep all commands, and we all fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23: “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”). Therefore legalism – with the objective to justify oneself by keeping all God’s commands – is doomed to fail.

This does not mean we should not be obedient! Jesus Himself teaches to keep His commands.  John 14:15: “If you love me, you will obey what I command” and John 14:21: “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me.” Being obedient is not the same as being legalistic. If a father ask his son to take the garbage out and the son does as he is told, is he legalistic or obedient? Likewise, we should be obedient to our heavenly Father and do as He asks us to do.
That has nothing to do with being legalistic, but everything with being obedient.

Tears

Inspiration and worship

Amen.                                            (for more of Coba's poems and devotionals)

Restoring a tradition: antique Christian Family Bibles from the 19th century:

Are you looking for an (Antique) Large, extensively illustrated, Family Bible?

One of those 'old-fashioned' large sized Bibles that will become part of your families tradition to be handed down from generation to generation? One of those 'huge' ones with a leather cover with gold leaf decorations and one or more brass or silver clasps to close the book? A Bible that is not only attractive to read and study and has multiples engraved illustrations on steel and wood, some in full color, but also contains special sheets to record (your) extensive family records? Or are you interested to obtain an antique 'classic' study Bible with an extensive concordance and Bible dictionary, multiple background essays (Bible history, translation history, background on Bible customs, the Holy Land etc.) and numerous illustrations and maps and commentaries? 

For more about antique Christian Bibles, visit our  Antique Family Bible Store

 "Prepared to Answer"

We love to share about the evidences - e-mail or call us if you would like us to come and share in your church, at your home, in school, at a seminar or any other setting.

We would be encouraged to hear from you at our mailing address or e-mail (see below).

Windmill Ministries * PO Box 1253 * Port Hadlock, WA 98339, USA
http://www.windmillministries.org
Rob & Jacoba VandeWeghe * e-mail: info@windmillministries.org

Windmill Ministries is a Christian apologetics ministry that equips believers and challenges skeptics through the sharing of evidences for the foundations of the Christian faith.

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