There is Only One God, pt. III, The Bible is True

[The following is in response to a question which was asked of me in person. This essay will reveal what the question was, and also my personal response at the time.]

Regarding our conversation about the feeding of the five thousand, whether such a miracle does the two things which you asked of it, I would like to give you a more formal and organized response. Please read this at your leisure, and with sensitive care for truth.

You asked two things of this story as found in the Bible. First you required of it that it be more than just a self-justifying story. Anyone can make up a story, and then assert it as truth and require belief: that does not make it true. Secondly, you wondered how it can be true because it defies all natural law, and is therefore incredible as a story.

My initial response was to ask why, if Jesus is the second person of the Trinity, and therefore has divine power, it would then be incredible that He fed five thousand from only five loaves and two fishes? I confess to you that this is only a partial answer, and that it does not adequately answer your need to know some things. Therefore I would like to give you a fuller answer, one that hopefully satisfies you concerning any doubts that you might have about the certainty of the miracle and of God’s hand at work in the creation.

Let me begin by confessing to you that I cannot fathom some things. I do not understand, for example, Einstein’s equation concerning mass and energy in relation to the speed of light: E=MC². I never took calculus in high school, so I don’t understand that either. There are a great many things in that one subject alone that I do not know. But all that in no way diminishes my certainty that when I add two numbers together, or subtract one from the other, or multiply or divide, that the result is an accurate one. No one is going to flim-flam me with his highly specialized education into doubting that certainty that I have in this one branch of mathematics called arithmetic. I have a very sure certainty, even though my knowledge is only partial. And that is not because I am so smart or so certain; it is because the system of arithmetic is certain.

What I am conveying by this example is that we as people, though our knowledge is only partial and limited, and even small in comparison with all of knowledge, yet can have certainty in some matters. We may even have doubts about some of the things that we are certain about, but that would in no way diminish the certainty of the thing itself. A most singular example of this would be a person’s assurance that God exists because he witnessed one thing that can only be explained by divine power and in no other way. He does not have to know the extent of God’s being, or have physical proof of God Himself, or understand all the mysteries of His attributes and character. If a person sees something that clearly goes beyond the possible of a naturally governed world, which can only be explained by divine power, then he can have assurance that there is a God.

The feeding of the five thousand is just such a miracle. You yourself attested that there can be no natural explanation for such a thing. That would seem to be just the point that is being made. That it did happen on a real hillside, at a real moment in history, there can be no doubt. After all, the story involves over five thousand people, anyone of whom could have denied the historicity of the account. The story was written to record the event for posterity, not to inform those who were there of an incident of which they were not ignorant. It was an old story for the first readers of the epistles, even for the many who were not there but knew about it all the same. It was a new story only for the wider audience and the following generations, whoever might read it for the first time. Many saw it and believed, because they saw it and ate of the bread and fish. Many had the opportunity to belie the story if it was not a true one, for the verity of the gospel accounts was of prime importance to the first generation of gospel readers, of those who were there and saw recounted in the gospel what they themselves had seen in person, or been made aware of by these witnesses. Many opponents had the opportunity to provide proofs that such things did not happen as they were recounted among the believers and as told to unbelievers. But their main concern was not how to counter the stories of the deeds themselves, and that was because they were real and could not be denied.

They were not concerned about how to counter stories about alleged deeds, but rather about how to counter the teaching what was supported by such undeniable deeds, undeniable even by those who should have been the first to dispute them. There was no counter argument in the society itself, neither from the believers nor from the unbelievers, which could deny that they happened. So indelibly clear were these events.

When Peter and John healed the man who was lame from birth, the very people who most opposed their ministry said, "What shall we do with these men? For that a notable sign has been performed through them is evident to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it.” (Acts 4:16)

These certain and sure works of divine power occurred and could not be denied. It is true that in our day we could question the validity of the “stories” because none of us were there to witness them ourselves. And our belief would seem to rely on witnesses who can no longer either confirm or deny them. But that was not the case, most definitely not the case, in the First Century when these accounts were being talked about constantly, and were recorded in written form for all posterity. Anyone could have questioned their authenticity. Therefore it is all the more curious that not even the fiercest opponents claimed that these miracles did not occur, but rather conceded that they did happen; and were concerned about how to oppose a teaching that was so undeniably accompanied by such miraculous works. 

So these are not stories that are self-contained to prove their own teachings, as you suggest. They are accounts that could easily have been belied at any time by anyone. And counter claims could have been raised at the time as well. There can be no doubt that these miraculous things did happen, that five thousand people were fed out of five loaves and two fishes, because even the opponents of our Lord did not deny that they did indeed happen.

Secondly, the miracle’s claim is just that very thing which you say causes you to doubt it. It is so far beyond natural physical laws that it can be nothing else but unbelievable. And whether it was a scientifically ignorant era in time, compared to our own, or a more sophisticated time, it does not seem to matter to the argument, because even by today’s standards you cannot feed five thousand people from five loaves of bread and two fishes, and still have twelve baskets left over. Physically speaking, it is not possible. But that is just the point. This proves that nothing else but divine power can do this.

That this happened cannot be doubted, even by the opponents of Jesus’ ministry. These adversaries were at a loss as to what to do about it, but they could not deny these works. But now we also see that nothing else but divine power could do such a thing in this particular instance, for no physical explanation is possible to us in our scientifically knowledgeable age which could explain it, and thereby deny its’ miraculous character.

There is only one question left to answer. Could any other being than God have done this, a being bestowed with a divine-like power who could do works beyond any natural or physical law? Such a being, we should assume, would have to have some kind of super-natural power. There can be no doubt that Jesus did this miracle, that it happened, and that it was beyond any natural explanation. But Jesus claimed to be God, and not to be just a god. He claimed to be that divine power which rules all divine power, even the lesser ones if there were such gods. Now if God was such a God as He said He was, then He would not allow Himself to be so misrepresented by a lower divine power so as to fool His people into thinking that this Jesus, who claimed to be God Himself, and forgave sins which only God could forgive, and made claims for God that only God could make, and that He could do so with such impunity if He were not really God or not officially representing Him, that this Jesus was God if He really was not truly this supreme God.

 A lower being would not be supported by God’s approval if He did such miraculous deeds for his own glory and not to serve God’s intended will for His people. God would not approve, and His all-knowing eye would see it, and would punish it plainly enough so that His own witness of His will would prevail. If a lower being than God, divine but not God (granting for the moment that there was such a being), did do such works then he could only do so with God’s permission, and only to do God’s will. Otherwise God Himself would counter them. But a lesser being who was divine would not receive God’s blessing or approval if he claimed that he himself was this God instead of being only a messenger of God. God would not allow such deception to serve His perfect will. But this is just what Jesus claimed to be: He claimed to be the very Son of God, that He was one with the Father, that He had authority to forgive sins without first asking the Father, that He had authority with the Holy Spirit to teach God’s truth without saying, “Thus says the Lord!” He did not have to say that if He was the Lord. Jesus had only to say, “Truly, truly I say to you…”, and did not say “Thus says the Lord” as if He was not the Lord Himself. God would not have allowed such audacity, and still allow such miraculous deeds to occur. God allowed the miracles to happen, and therefore showed approval of Jesus, and therefore also of His unique claims.

There can be no doubt, then, that these things did happen just as the witnesses testified. There can also be no doubt that these were indeed miraculous deeds, even by today’s knowledgeable standards. And lastly, there can be no doubt that God approved the person who did them, and therefore also approved His lofty and unique claims about Himself. That these things are proofs of God’s existence there can be no doubt, even though we believe them through the testimonies of long dead witnesses. The questions or doubts which we might have of these accounts can in no way lessen the certainty of these accounts. The doubts and questions speak of our weaknesses, not of any weakness of the testimony itself. They speak of men’s stubborn hearts to remain unconvinced, not of any uncertainty of the proofs themselves. Though I cannot explain all of these things, my certainty in them is not lessened by even the smallest amount due to my small and limited understanding.

I have tried to show you the reasonability that is bound up in the faith. We cannot accede to the world’s standard for faith that allows ‘faith’ to be defined both by its’ meaning and its’ opposite. To the world unbelief is just another kind of belief, but to a Christian faith and un-faith are opposites, and cannot be merely different forms of the same thing. If truth is merely a matter of the mind for each person, then it is not truth at all, but only that which a person convinces himself of whether true or not. It would be wrong to call that truth, because it would confuse real truth with untruth. The world accepts this kind of definition, that one person’s truth is another person’s untruth, and that these are just two kinds of truths even if they’re opposites; but Christians cannot. Christians do not believe in their truth; they believe in the Truth.

Anybody can belie the claims that Christians make, but though every age has tried to do so yet no such attempts have yet succeeded. The true Church still lives by the same confession which the Bible in Heb. 4:14 admonishes us to hold fast. If we have such a high priest in Jesus who fed five thousand, and who died for us and rose again, who passed through the heavens, then let us hold fast this confession. Many centuries have gone by, and each one of them has seen men of learning attempt to demonstrate the contradictions of this confession; and yet today the Church stands tall with the same confession as the very first churches, still holding it fast.