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40 What Books and Words Make Up the Christian Scriptures?
name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved”
(Acts 4:12).
That conviction was rooted in what Jesus himself had taught: “Truly,
truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent
me has eternal life” (John 5:24). And this was an exclusive claim: “I am
the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except
through me” (John 14:6). So his followers taught, “Whoever has the
Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life”
(1 John 5:12).
To reject the words of Jesus’s apostles when they preached in his
name, and wrote the New Testament, was to spurn eternal life. “Paul
and Barnabas spoke out boldly, saying, ‘It was necessary that the
word of God be spoken first to you. Since you thrust it aside and
judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we are turning to
the Gentiles’” (Acts 13:46). To thrust this word of God away is to
thrust away life.
So, I say it again: if the claim of such a book is true, then that book
is more important than any other book. It has more to offer us than any
other book. And what it offers is of infinite importance.
What Book Are We Talking About?
This means that even before we show how this book reveals its truth,
we need to clarify what book we are talking about. If we are going to
gaze through the window of this book in the hope of finding everlasting
life and inexpressible joy, then we need to know which book we are
talking about. And that life and joy are precisely what we hope to find.
The fullest life possible. And inexpressible joy.
If that is not what we find at the end of our quest, then we are wasting
our time. And, be assured, that is precisely what the book claims to
offer: “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (John
10:10). “Though you do not now see [Jesus], you believe in him and
rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining
the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls” (1 Pet. 1:8–9).
Fullness of everlasting life and inexpressible joy in the greatest person
in the universe, Jesus, the Son of God.