“The Bible is the most amazing book in the world. And when we’re tempted to feel bored with it, we may need to step back and remember how marvelous and unique and powerful this piece of literature is. The Bible is simply unequaled in its influence, audacious in its claims, and unrivaled in its power to transform hardened sinners into humble saints.”

Let’s say you were given this assignment: construct a book that will remain relevant for millennia and radically influence the greatest civilizations in the history of the world. How would you do it?

Would you think that compiling the book’s contents over 1,500 years, employing at least 40 different authors, incorporating numerous and very different genres, and originally composing it in three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek) is a good strategy? I doubt it.

It’s good God doesn’t consult us on things like this.

The Bible is the most amazing book in the world. And when we’re tempted to feel bored with it, we may need to step back and remember how marvelous and unique and powerful this piece of literature is. The Bible is simply unequaled in its influence, audacious in its claims, and unrivaled in its power to transform hardened sinners into humble saints.

Unequaled

Just think about what God was aiming to accomplish in the Bible. He purposed to convey the truth of redemption (the gospel) in ways that would be understood and believed by people in thousands of diverse cultures, speaking thousands of different languages, over thousands of years. Have you ever thought how incredible it is that the message of the Bible can be believed, and the gospel can be lived out, in the most primitive and most sophisticated cultures on earth — in every age?

Not only that, but God determined to make the most important parts of the Bible comprehensible to small children and uneducated adults, and yet be able to withstand the most rigorous pounding of academic literary criticism. The Bible has taken, and continues to take, more critical cannon fire than any other book in history, and the ship just won’t sink.

The Bible would not likely be chosen by the literati who give out the Nobel Prize for literature, though it certainly contains remarkable works of art. Nevertheless, it has and continues to shape the course of world history like no other book ever has. As a historical phenomenon, it is simply unequaled.

Audacious

And the Bible is unashamedly audacious in its claims. That’s why it either inspires devotion or hatred in its readers. Because as J.C. Ryle says,

If the Bible is not the word of God and inspired, the whole of Christendom for 1,800 [now 2,000] years has been under an immense delusion; half the human race has been cheated and deceived, and churches are monuments of folly. If the Bible is the word of God and inspired, all who refuse to believe it are in fearful danger; they are living on the brink of eternal misery. (Old Paths, 11)

The Bible claims it is “breathed out by God” (2 Timothy 3:16), “perfect” (Psalm 19:7), and “living and active,” able to discern “the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).

And at the climax of the written word is the recorded life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, who the written word calls the Word incarnate (John 1:1). And the incarnate Word claimed audaciously that he was the same word that issued from Moses’s burning bush (Exodus 3:14; John 8:58), and declared unequivocally that he was “the way, and the truth, and the life” and that no one comes to God except through him (John 14:6).

Take the written word at its word, and take Jesus at his word, and a reader must either bow to Jesus as Creator of all and Savior of those who repent, or reject him as the most dangerous megalomaniac of all time. Either Bible-believers are deluded fools, or Bible-unbelievers are in terrible peril. There is no real middle ground. The only people who are lukewarm about the Bible are those who don’t take its claims seriously.

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