In 2 Timothy 3:16 the apostle Paul states:
‘All Scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, for rebuking, for correction, for training in uprightness.’
As followers of Jesus Christ it is essential that we hold fast to what this verse teaches. God has designed the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments to teach us truth for what we need to know. The Bible can rightly be called ‘The Manual for the Human Life’.
So the Bible teaches what is true. And it consistently teaches what is true. Note how Paul says that all Scripture is God-breathed.
It’s not quite so simple
However, when we come to closely examine Scripture, we find that its truthfulness is not actually a simple subject. I am not suggesting that the Bible in any way fails to accomplish what 2 Timothy 3:16 says. But when we get into the details, we find that things are a little more complicated than many assume.
Failure to recognise this is not really dangerous in itself. But there are two problems that often arise when Christians have simplistic assumptions about precisely what they mean when they say that the Bible is true.
Problems with simplistic assumptions about the Bible
First, there is the problem of Christians doubting the inspiration of the Bible or even doubting the Christian faith itself.
A Christian may have certain assumptions about what it means to
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Even if, improbably in my view, Matthew 27:45-28:1 can be interpreted to allow for three periods of day-time between Jesus’ death and resurrection, there were only two periods of night-time. Jesus was dead during the night-time of Friday to Saturday and during the night-time of Saturday to Sunday. But there was no third period of night-time. So the three days and three nights cannot mean three periods of day-time plus three periods of