In a world full of skeptics and alternate theories, Christians are called upon to,

"Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense, to everyone that asks you to give an account for the hope that is within you." (1 Peter 3:15)

The word defense as used in this scripture is the Greek word apologia. It is a legal word that indicates the defending of one's conduct or behavior, as one would in court. This is the same word Paul used when defending himself before the Jews (Acts 22:1) and before Festus (Acts 25:16). In other words, this is the kind of defense Paul used when he was on trial and his life was at stake. From this word we derive the word apologetics, the field of study defending the Christian faith... a defense not to be taken lightly.

This section of knowtruth is therefore designed to provide a prima facie case for the reliability of the New Testament. Black's Law Dictionary defines a prima facie case as one that will prevail until contradicted and overcome by other evidence. In today's civil courts, cases are decided by a preponderance of the evidence. This means,

"Evidence which is of greater weight or more convincing than the evidence which is offered in opposition to it; that is, evidence which as a whole shows that the fact sought to be proved is more probable than not." ¹

Dr. John Warwick Montgomery, Dean of the Simon Greenleaf School of Law, applied these rules and concluded,

"Applied to the gospel records, and reinforced by responsible lower criticism, this rule would establish competency in any court of law." ²

Evaluating manuscripts from a literary point of view is another valid analytical approach. C. Sanders, military historian, describes in his book, Introduction to Research in English Literary History, the method by which historic documents are evaluated for authenticity and accuracy. This generally accepted method is composed of three lines of evidence.

First, the bibliographic test, which demonstrates the textual integrity of the document. Second, the internal evidence test, which examines whether the document is internally congruent. Did first person witnesses write it? Does it contain contradictions? Third, the external evidence test, which tests the claims of the document against external historical and archaeological data. The following pages contain brief descriptions of how each of these tests can be applied to the New Testament manuscripts.

• Bibliographic Evidence Tests
• Internal Evidence Tests
• External Evidence Tests: Contemporary Testimony, Archaeology, Prophecy.

F.F. Bruce summed up this evaluation regarding the historical reliability of the New Testament documentation by saying this,

"There is, I imagine, no body of literature in the world that has been exposed to the stringent analytical study that the four gospels have sustained for the past 200 years. This is not something to be regretted: it is something to be accepted with satisfaction. Scholars today who treat the gospels as credible historical documents do so in the full light of this analytical study, not by closing their minds to it." ³

Coupling our understanding of the accuracy and authenticity of the New Testament with the powerful evidence of Biblical prophecy provides a fresh and objective view of God's word. It provides us with the confidence to trust the Bible as God's divine wisdom and will.

As I was writing this article I had an interesting conversation with a coworker regarding Christianity. In brief, this person felt that in order to be a Christian one had to "feel spiritual." I challenged him with the idea that feelings are subjective, while God's word is objective truth. If one's feelings are considered guideposts for spirituality, how do we answer when feelings conflict? What do we say when my feelings are different than yours? Feelings are just that - feelings… emotions. They are not necessarily truth.

Being firmly rooted in the fact that God's word is accurate, reliable, and divine in origin provides me with a place to go for truth. When I have opinions or feelings about things I can measure them against an objective truth, rather than subjective human emotion. When we have conflict, we can settle it with authoritative truth rather than human opinion.