WHY THE BIBLE?

1. To love and be loved is the most persistent and urgent of all our desires. We all know, intuitively,
without anybody ever telling us, that we are made for faithful, trust-worthy relationships. Our hearts
are fueled by hungry yearnings for connection, interpersonal engagement, and a sense of belonging.
According to the Bible, there is a simple and profound reason for this. Compare Genesis 1:27 and 1
John 4:16 to discover why.

(NOTE: All scripture is taken from New King James Version (NKJV) unless otherwise noted.)

love
As creatures of the divine image, we are engineered for giving and receiving .
That's what and who we are as human beings.

It logically follows that a God of self-giving love, who would create others in His image, would be a
communicator by nature since communication is intrinsic to the healthy operations of love. We would
expect that a God of love would naturally want to be known by those He has made. And this is
precisely what we find to be the case. Jesus Christ, who claimed to be God in the flesh, got to the
heart of this matter:

know
No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not what his master is doing; but I
friends made
have called you , for all things that I heard from My Father I have
know n
to you (John 15:15).

2.Here we encounter the most incredible thing imaginable: the most powerful Person in the
universenone other than Goddoesnt want to dominate us by His power, but rather He desires to
befriend us by means of communicationby making Himself known to us. And this explains why
God has given us a book composed of words:

scripture inspiration
All is given by of God (2 Timothy 3:16).

The Biblehere called Scripturemakes the bold claim that it is Gods communication device.
But remember what Jesus said: friendship is the goal of His communication to us. The Bible is not
intended to exert coercive authority over our rational process and demand blind compliance. The
Bible claims, rather, to be the medium through which God discloses His love and opens the way for
us to know Him. Regarding human words Jesus said, Out of the abundance of the heart his mouth
speaks (Luke 6:45). Likewise, if the Bible is Gods word, then we can expect to find in it an
unfolding of Gods heart. But how can we be confident that the Bible is what it claims to be?

A GOD WHO KNOWS AND CAN BE KNOWN

3.There once lived a king who was completely self-absorbed. Intoxicated with his power, all he could
think about was how great he was. One day God tapped him on the shoulder by giving him a
prophetic dream that revealedget thismore than 2,500 years of world history in advance. In the
process the proud king was humbled and transformed. The story is recorded for us in Daniel 2-4.

In his dream, the king saw a metal-man image with a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, belly and
thighs of brass, legs of iron, feet of iron and clay, and a stone that struck the image at the feet, ground
it to powder and became a great mountain. The prophet Daniel, a captive in Babylon, interpreted the
dream for the Babylonian king.

4. Read and discuss the interpretation of the dream in Daniel 2:36-45.

Written some 600 years before the time of Christ, the prophecy received by King Nebuchadnezzar
foretold the rise and fall of four successive empires and the formation of modern Europe, providing
convincing proof that the Bible is of supernatural originthat it is, in fact, inspired by God. It is a
matter of historical fact that exactly what the dream foretold came to pass: Babylon was succeeded by
Media Persia, which was succeeded by Greece, which was succeeded by Rome, which divided into
the ten main kingdoms of Western Europe. The accurate fulfilment of the first five parts of the vision
gives us the assurance that the final prediction will come to pass as well: the God of heaven will set
up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed (verse 44).

6. This astounding prophecy brings us face to face with a God who knows the future, which can only
mean that we are face to face with a God who knows us as well. He knows everything weve ever
done and will do, every one of our weaknesses and failures. And yet, knowing everything about us,
He still loves us and longs to be our friend. Not merely a warm, fuzzy friend who will affirm us in our
destructive course, but a true friend who will prove Himself dangerous to our selfishness. It was just
such an encounter with God that radically transformed Nebuchadnezzars heart:
Now praise extol honor
I, Nebuchadnezzar, and and the King of
truth justice
heaven, all of whose works are , and His ways . And those who walk in
pride He is able to put down (Daniel 4:37).

7. Now God and the king were friends. Bible prophecy invites each of us, as well, into friendship with
God by giving us a rational basis for trusting Him. Jesus explained the relational purpose of Bible
prophecy like this:
before
Now I have told you it comes to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might
believe
(John 14:29).

The whole point of Bible prophecy is to give us a solid foundation for faith in God. Through it He
whispers to us, You can believe in Me! But not only does God know each of us, He also wants us to
know Him. Addressing God the Father, Jesus said, This is eternal life, that they may know You
(John 17:3). In the Greek the word know is ginsk, and refers to the intimate kind of knowing we
experience in a relationship, not merely to factual knowledge. Later in this prayer Jesus enlarged the
idea by asking the Father for something truly amazing: that the love with which You loved Me may
be in them, and I in them (John 17:26). Eternal lifeor salvationis not merely an endless duration
of life, but also a specific quality of life that is defined by knowing God as an intimate friend. God
wants to be known, and can be known. He has provided for us to know Him through the truths
disclosed in Scripture.

ONE CORE TRUTH

8. As we study Scripture we need a direction, an orientation on the biblical landscape. In this series of
[truth] Link study guides we will discover over and over again that God is love (1 John 4:16).
Gods love is the one truth that defines every other truth. Truth is not merely a list of factual topics,
but rather a composite whole that paints a picture of who God is in character. Since the core reality of
Gods character is love, it follows that all truth is simply, and profoundly, an unfolding of God's love.
We can expect, then, that every true doctrine reveals some dimension of Gods love, and we can be
equally certain that any teaching that contradicts Gods love is, by definition, false. This will be our
working criterion in the [truth] Link study guides. With the God-is-love premise before us, we have
the base equation for working out all truth. Our compass is now set to true north. We know where
were going and what were looking for as we make our journey through Scripture.

Connect
9. Truth is not merely a list of abstract ideas or a collection of factual data. Rather, truth is an
embodied reality, the sum total of which is to be found in the revelation of God in the person of Jesus
Christ

The entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, is a disclosure of Gods character. It reveals who God is
at hearthow God thinks, feels, and behaves. Every story, prophecy, and doctrine of Scripture invites
us into personal relationship with God upon the premise that God is worth knowing, that God is
attractive, because God is love.

Each morning you wake up and pursue life. Sure, you go after things like education and career,
material comforts and adventurous experiences. But deep down you know you were made for
something moresomething incredible and amazing and extraordinary. That something more is
connection with your Maker. Getting to know Him is the most meaningful thing you can pursue and
doing so makes everything else fall into place.
Experience

10. I want to hear Gods voice speaking to me, in my heart, through the pages of the Bible
God is a fundamentally relational being. As such, He has things to say in order to communicate His
thoughts and feelings to us. King David expressed well what we can expect as we explore the truths of
Scripture: I rejoice at Your word as one who finds great treasure (Psalm 119:162). Gods word is of
extreme value. The kind of treasure we discover in Gods word is the infinitely valuable experience of
knowing God for ourselves and discovering the personal reality of His beautiful love.