Shameful Testimony

If a person is creating a story and narrative, odds are high that they will make themselves look good and try to save face. After all, who would know? Yet, the authors of the Bible share story after story of times they have screwed up and fallen short of expectations. If you were trying to start a religion and crafting stories from your mind, would you put in details that make you feel ashamed?

Historical Testimony

This ties into the Eye-Witness testimony. The texts of the Bible have historically verfiable claims, names, and statements that all line up with the historical records. These are most notable in Luke, wherein there are over thirty historical details that have been verified by secular and historical texts. This demonstrates that the Bible is written by people who were present and knowledgeable about history.

Early Testimony

Is it true that the texts were written chronologically near to the events that are discussed?
Yes!
Most scholars agree that most of the New Testament was written before 70 A.D. That is within 40 years after Jesus's death. Some of the earliest manuscripts we have are dated within 25 years of Jesus's death!

Prophesied Testimony

This one takes some faith. Jesus fulfilled many Old Testament prophecies, from vague to oddly specific. These range from being born to a woman and being born in Bethlehem to dying on a tree and rising from the dead. While one needs to believe in the Old Testament for this argument to hold water, for those that do, it is hard to ignore that Jesus fits all of the prophesies of the coming Messiah, albeit in ways that differed signficantly from expectation.

Eye-Witness Testimony

What good is an early testimony if it is written by people who were totally uninvolved? Good news is, our manuscripts were, at the very least, seen by those who walked with Jesus as they were ciruclated during their lifetimes within their churches. This means that even if the gospels were not written directly by apostles the apostles had to sign off on them for them to be circulated in their churches which means that the content has been verified by eye-witnesses.

Rival Testimony

There is documentation that confirms the content of the New Testament that come from anti-Christian sources. These sources can be found in Roman documentation which documents the death of Jesus, some of Jesus's teachings, and the willingness of the disciples to die for their faith that Jesus rose from the dead. There are also Jewish historical records, most notably from the Jewish historian Josephus.

Deadly Testimony

Not only did the authors suffer embarassment from the events of the Bible, but the New Testament authors suffered extreme pain as a result of their testimonies. This ranged from beatings and lashings to crucifixion and public execution to ostricization from their friends and families. The authors lost literally everything and all they had to do was admit that they were wrong or made it up. People are willing to suffer and die for something they believe to be true, but they are not willing to do so for something they know to be false. If anyone was to know if the stories in the gospels were true about Jesus and His miracles, would it not be the people who traveled with Him? The same people who were killed for their testimonies of Jesus are those who would be given freedom from death and pain if they only denounced their faith and claims that they knew for certain to be true or false.