Consider also that our Lord’s patience brings salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom God gave him. He writes this way in all his letters, speaking in them about such matters. Some parts of his letters are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. Therefore, beloved, since you already know these things, be on your guard so that you will not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure standing. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. – 2 Peter 3:15-18 BSB

Warrior;
God gave us the Bible as an instruction manual for how to expand and grow our faith. The Bible has been called an acronym: Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16-17) Peter is telling us about the importance of making a committed effort to grow in our knowledge and service of God. There is something else going on here, as well. The overarching purpose of Peter’s letter was to convince readers not to fall prey to the influence of false teachers and heretics. Peter is encouraging us to grow in our faith. Just as early Christians had to be able to tune out the voices of all those who denied the divinity of Christ, and all the other FALSE CHATTER…and stay focused on their belief in God and the grace of Jesus. The message is similar for us modern Christians. We can’t grow in faith if we allow ourselves to be distracted from our relationship with God. We maintain and grow that relationship by being IN HIS WORD. These last days are filled with false teachers and distractions. If the devil can’t make you BAD, he will make you busy! Too busy to be in the WORD, and to COMMUNE DAILY with Yahweh. To be able to grow in our faith, we must remain focused and resist anything that threatens that focus. Remember, it is written: “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17). We must understand it is the BIBLE ALONE, that is inspired by God. There are many extra-Biblical resources, however, it is the BIBLE ALONE that is the INSPIRED WORD OF GOD. If you don’t believe in the Bible, then HOW CAN YOU BELIEVE IN JESUS? Transitive Principle says, If A=B, and B=C, then A=C. Jesus is the Word of God (John 1), the Word of God is the Bible. Therefore Jesus=Bible. The Bible is a collection of sacred books written by ancient prophets and historians. These authors recorded the relationship between God and His people for over 4,000 years. Their inspired words are what we know today as the Holy Bible. Do you believe in the Bible?

Leader, Russ Whitten blogged about some of the truths that science has uncovered that validate the Bible. Modern archaeology has helped us realize that the Bible is historically accurate even in the smallest of details. There have been thousands of archaeological discoveries in the past century that support every book of the Bible. Here are just a few examples. Critics used to believe: the Bible was wrong because they felt that King David was a legendary, mythical character. They pointed to the fact that there was no archaeological evidence that King David was an actual historical figure. But then … in 1994, archaeologists discovered an ancient stone slab in northern Galilee that was inscribed with the references to King David and the “House of David.” Critics used to believe: the Bible was wrong because there was no evidence (outside of the Bible) that a group of people called the Hittites ever existed. The Hittite civilization is mentioned approximately 40 times in the Old Testament; thus, skeptics were convinced that this proved the Bible is a mythical creation of ancient Hebrew writers. But then … in 1906, a German archaeologist named Hugo Winckler was excavating in Boghaz-Koi, Turkey, and discovered the capital city of the ancient Hittite empire, the entire Hittite library and 10,000 clay tablets documenting the Hittite history. Scholars translated these writings and discovered that everything the Bible said about the Hittite empire was true. As Science advances, and as archeological finds are amassed, the Bible is verified as historically accurate and spiritually necessary to be all that we were created to be, because of the knowledge of our Creator, our Father, our Counselor, our Redeemer- through His Holy Word, the Bible!

Conduit, critics used to believe: the book of Acts was not historically accurate. A man named Sir William Ramsay, who is well known to be one of the greatest historical scholars and archaeologists in history, decided to try to disprove the Bible as the inspired Word of God by showing that the book of Acts was not historically accurate. But then … after 30 years of archaeological research in the Middle East, Ramsay concluded that “Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy … this author should be placed along with the very greatest historians.” He later wrote a book on the trustworthiness of the Bible based on his discoveries and converted to Christianity. Sir Ramsay found no historical or geographical mistakes in the book of Acts. This is amazing when we realize that in the book of Acts, Luke mentions 32 countries, 54 cities, nine Mediterranean islands and 95 people and he did not get one wrong. Compare that with the Encyclopedia Britannica. The first year the Encyclopedia Britannica was published it contained so many mistakes regarding places in the United States that it had to be recalled. The Smithsonian Institution’s Department of Anthropology has offered the following official statement pertaining to the historical reliability of the Old Testament: “… the historical books of the Old Testament are as accurate historical documents as any that we have from antiquity and are in fact more accurate than many of the Egyptian, Mesopotamian, or Greek histories. These Biblical records can be and are used as are other ancient documents in archaeological work.” The great Jewish archaeologist Nelson Glueck, who is known to be one of the top three archaeologists in history, has stated the following: “No archaeological discovery has ever contradicted a single, properly understood Biblical statement.” BUT GOD! But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) The TIME IS NOW, to BELIEVE in the Bible as the WORD OF GOD! The only way to get to KNOW HIM better is to be IN HIS WORD. When you BELIEVE IN HIS WORD, then you ACT out! As James said, “What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? (James 2:14-20)