Evidence-based Faith
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People often criticise Christians for having a 'blind faith'. You may have heard some of the criticisms people say - or you may think them yourself:

"Why believe in something you have no evidence for?"

"What makes you think that your God is real and gods of the other religions aren't?"

"We're all atheists about most gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further."

As Christians, we disagree with these statements and questions. We believe that there is evidence - not just for a God, but for the God of the Bible.

Our faith isn't blind but is based on evidence that we have weighed up and found convincing. It is because of this evidence that we believe there is one God...and that this one God is the God of the Christian Bible.

Here we present a quick summary of some of the evidence - the top headlines. If you want to discuss any of this further, then please get in touch. We may not convince you completely of our faith, but we hope to show you that it is anything but 'blind'.

The Evidence
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The resurrection of Jesus

Christian faith finds meaning in the resurrection of Jesus. It shows that he was the son of God. The claim that he rose from the dead may seem incredible but there is actually a substantial amount of evidence to confirm that it did happen. This includes the evidence of the empty tomb, and the witness of over 500 of his followers who were willing to suffer and die in order to spread the good news that Jesus Christ of Nazareth had been raised from the dead by God.

For more information click here.

Prophecy

The Bible contains a large number of prophecies that foretold future events to their recipients (and to us) in great detail. This is because God uses prophecies to prove the authority of His messengers and His Word. Many of these prophecies have been fulfilled but there are still some that are yet to happen. By looking at prophecies that were accurately fulfilled many years after they were told, we can be confident that the Bible is indeed God's message and that the remaining prophecies about the future of the world will come to pass.

For more information click here.

Consistency

A common misconception about the Bible is that it is a 'loose collection of bronze-age tales' and perhaps this is what one would expect from the variety of authors involved in its creation. However the Bible is a remarkably unified set of books which outline God's promises to his people, the salvation of men and women, and the eventual future for the world. The incredible consistency of the message contained within the Bible demonstrates an intellect behind its writing that goes beyond the capabilities of a single person or a collective group of people. It could only have been written by God.

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Science

It may seem counterintuitive to list science as a reason for believing in the God of the Bible as many say that 'science has disproved the existence of God'. However the truth is that scientific discovery is constantly revealing the secrets of the world that God created. For example, the universe is extremely well-suited for life and appears to be neither infinitely large nor infinitely old. Furthermore, life is too complicated to have come about by chance, something that is particularly noticeable when you consider the complexity of DNA. For a balanced universe and complex life to have come into existence, there must be a divine creator, God.

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Law ahead of time

The Bible is a collection of very old texts, some of which were written over 3500 years ago. We would therefore imagine that the Bible would be full of scientific inaccuracies that were based on people's understanding at the time. The Bible is not a science textbook and therefore makes no attempt to explain scientific things. However, in the statements it does make it always avoids making scientific errors that a human author from the time would have believed, unless they were inspired. The Law of Moses in particular is full of laws that are vastly ahead of its time, scientifically speaking. This gives us confidence that the Bible is not 'just thoughts of Bronze Age men' but rather the inspired word of God.

For more information click here.