Man from the sky to fix the world?

The Bible claims that there is a God who created the universe and all living things. A God who knows everything! It also claims that God organized the writing of the Bible. So it’s not like a novel that can give us whatever fictional plot line the author might invent.

If there is a God, and we’re meant to take the Bible seriously, then it has to contain enough evidence for us to believe its ‘plot line’, which is basically -

God created man. Things turned ugly. God organized a plan to fix it. (which is where the man out of the sky bit fits in)

It also claims to be able to accurately and specifically predict future events.  Really?? Surely that’s impossible…

It’s a massive book, so it’s packed with information that can quite easily be checked.
If there is a God who knows everything, and this is His book, there can’t be wrong information, or wrong predictions, or else the Bible would be a fake.  I’m not talking about things that are vague and debatable – I mean things that are big and clear and wrong. 

On the other hand, to believe in all that the Bible says, and to be convinced in the ‘man out of the sky’ thing, all your checking has to find the exact opposite - big and clear and right!

Our family reads the Bible every day on a plan that gets us through the entire book every year. Honestly, as we read, I still check for wrong information in there. What a waste if I’m believing in a book that’s a lie. And that’s the bottom line – if there is no God, then the Bible is actually a massive fraud written by a bunch of liars… As an aside, I just can’t figure out who would bother going to that much effort… 

Before getting to the “predicting the future” stuff, there’s a few bits of scientific and medical information that I find amazing. The Bible is ‘somehow’ VERY advanced for its time! Here’s some things it says...

1. The earth is a circle, and hangs on nothing. 
2. Air travels north, then moves to the south, and keeps on circulating around.

These two points are obvious to us now as we can look back from space and see the earth floating there like a ball with it’s atmosphere surrounding it… Finding that kind of detail in such an ancient book is astounding to me.

1. Water runs down into the ocean and then goes back to where it started and keeps going around and around.

 Apparently the water cycle wasn’t taken as fact until the early 19th century. Incredible to me that it’s explained so long before that in the Bible.

1. If you touch something that’s diseased, wash your hands in running water. 
2. If you need to go to the toilet, do it away from where people live, and bury it! 

These seem so logical to us now, but the Bible explained these medical facts way before we had worked them out. 

Things like that help me want to investigate whether the Bible is from God or not. I don’t reckon a “bunch of liars” writing a book that’s a “fraud”, would be very likely to come up with stuff like that! 

Anyway, the truly amazing thing is the way it predicts the future.
There’s more to choose from, but I don’t want this to be too long, so I’m only going to talk about one topic.
The Bible actually tells us that God said - “The Jews are my witnesses” and  “They are my people”. (The ‘man coming out of the sky’ is a Jew too!)

If they are God’s “witnesses”, then looking at them should give us evidence that He exists, and that we can believe in His plan for fixing the world.

What has happened to them is astounding. The fact that they still exist as a race is kind of impossible. Look at this list.

1. Over 2000 years ago most of them were taken out of Israel as captives.
2. Many of them were killed.
3. Their capital city Jerusalem, was smashed.
4. The remaining Jews were scattered all around the world.
5. They have been hated and persecuted.
6. Even their name “Jew” has been used as a derogatory slang term.
7. They survived as Jews despite being spread out like that.
8. They also survived Hitler’s attempt to exterminate them.
9. They had no existing country to go home to, then the state of Israel was re-established.
10. Masses of Jews returned home to Israel.
11. The surrounding countries way outnumbered them and promised to drive them out by force.
12. Despite being completely outnumbered, they somehow survive to this day.

   It’s such a unique history…

There is just no way anybody could have predicted what has happened to them.

Certainly not liars writing a fraud – but somehow the Bible has been  able to clearly predict that the Jews would be taken out of their land, spread around the world, ridiculed, have their name used as  derogatory slang, hated, persecuted, killed, and then return to their land and survive. It’s stunning. Impossible that someone could have guessed all that...

Back in my Grandfather’s day, their history was up to around point 7 on my list, and despite all the incredible predictions that had been correct up till his time, the Jews still had no country to return to.

He, and lots of other Bible readers, watched world events…hoping the Bible would continue to get things right.

1917 – Amazing – The Balfour Declaration. Support for the establishment of a home in Israel, for the Jewish people. The Bible prediction seemed to be on it’s way to happening. 

It took another 31 years of watching and I guess, hoping!  

Then on May 14 1948, the State of Israel was proclaimed, and they started returning home in earnest from all around the world.

Since then, even right through my lifetime, we’ve seen them survive through wars that seemed impossible to win.

It’s been amazing for people to see Bible predictions happening in their own lifetime!

The Bible actually says that if someone predicts the future and gets it wrong, then the prediction is not from God.
The Bible has so many correct predictions, and no wrong ones...
It’s such powerful evidence.

Last thing. A personal example of how easily such a massive book, saying so many specific things, could have got it wrong. What if it said “the Jews are my people and no-one is ever going to use their name as slang”?? 

Then what would I have done when this happened to me?

It was a few years ago and I was weeding at our home, pulling out a succulent ground hugging weed that spreads EVERYWHERE. Aaaaarrrggghhh - It’s unstoppable. 

For years I had thought it was called…”Wandering Dew”… 

My wife heard how I said it one day, and told me that its actual name is “Wandering Jew”… Wow…  Another correct Bible prediction staring me in the face in my own back yard.

I just can’t get past it. The Bible keeps showing that it’s from God, and is packed full of evidence that basically forces me to believe the one BIG prediction that’s left to come true…

Jesus will come back and fix the world – and don’t we need it!

Theses days we are absolutely bombarded with information all day every day, and all this Bible stuff could just be more information, and get lost in the fog...but if it’s right, then there’s actually a light at the end of the tunnel for a world in a mess. 

I’m convinced, and VERY happy to try my hardest to do all the Bible tells me to, so that I can be connected to the plan I believe God is working on to fix the world.