Isn't the Bible just a human book?

The short answer Settled

Scripture says it is God's word, not a story people made up. Its writers say they recorded what they saw and heard. They say the words began with God, not with them. And God backs His word with a test no human book could pass: telling what will happen before it happens.

What the writers say they saw

Peter writes, "we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty" (2 Peter 1:16). John writes of what he and the other apostles had heard and seen, "which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled" (1 John 1:1). Luke wrote from what "eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered" (Luke 1:2), so that his reader "may know the certainty" of it (Luke 1:4).

John also says why his record was written: "these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name" (John 20:31). The writers set their record apart from made-up stories, and they wrote it to be believed.

Where the words came from

The writers say the words did not start with them. "Prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit" (2 Peter 1:21). "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God" (2 Timothy 3:16), literally breathed out by God. Paul thanks God that the Thessalonians received his preaching "not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God" (1 Thessalonians 2:13). Men wrote it, but Scripture says the words began with God.

A test no made-up book could pass

God does not ask to be believed on a bare claim. He challenges the idols: "Show the things that are to come hereafter, That we may know that you are gods" (Isaiah 41:23). Then He meets that test Himself: "I am God, and there is none like Me" (Isaiah 46:9), "Declaring the end from the beginning" (Isaiah 46:10). And He says why He spoke ahead of time: "Before it came to pass I proclaimed it to you" (Isaiah 48:5), so that His people could not credit the outcome to an idol. A word that says what will happen before it happens did not start with a person.

Scripture records Him meeting that test many times, with the foretelling and the outcome both written down. Here are a few examples. A man of God said at the altar in Bethel, "a child, Josiah by name, shall be born to the house of David," and that "men's bones shall be burned on you" (1 Kings 13:2). About three hundred years later, Josiah burned bones on that altar "according to the word of the LORD which the man of God proclaimed" (2 Kings 23:16). Isaiah named Cyrus as the one who would say to Jerusalem, "You shall be built" (Isaiah 44:28), and about a hundred and fifty years later Cyrus said the LORD "has commanded me to build Him a house at Jerusalem" (Ezra 1:2). Micah named Bethlehem as the town "The One to be Ruler in Israel" would come from (Micah 5:2), and about seven hundred years later Jesus "was born in Bethlehem of Judea" (Matthew 2:1). These are only a few; Scripture records many more. The number of years is approximate and comes from the usual Bible timelines.

The usual objection

Many people hold that the Bible is a human book. Its stories, they say, grew over many years as they were retold, and were written by people who wanted others to follow them. Any book can claim to come from God, so that claim proves nothing, and the Bible's warning of a coming judgment is only human words.

Scripture names the very thing the argument says it is, a set of "cunningly devised fables," and denies it. Its writers present themselves as witnesses, not storytellers. And God does not rest His word on a bare claim; He names a test that a human book could not pass, and He stakes His word on it. Scripture records Him passing it.

The words behind it