Why Am I A Christian? I am sure many people out there question why anyone would be a Christian. “That’s just crazy stuff!” However, there are very real reasons why people are Christians.
The very real and typical answer is by the Grace of God. Period. See Ephesians 2:8-9.
But there are other reasons which are an outflow of God’s Grace in our lives.
Christianity’s Claim: Research the facts for yourself.
The Bible is a collection of over 60 books of different genres (history, poetry, wisdom, apocalyptic, etc…), spanning over 1,500 years, written by over 40 authors including shepherds and kings, fishermen and doctors, soldiers and lawyers. Compare that with any other religious book.
Further, there are over 5600 Greek manuscripts in existence which far outweigh the number of manuscripts to other ancient writings. Think Plato, Aristotle, Homer (Illiad), and others (See this chart for details).
Skeptics do not see this as definitive enough, however, “if the critics of the Bible dismiss the New Testament as reliable information, then they must also dismiss the reliability of the writings of Plato, Aristotle, Caesar, Homer, and the other authors.” It’s almost as if skeptics dismiss the Bible without looking into the evidence.
The Bible may look like it has contradictions and other issues on the surface, but the Bible has a self-consistency that surpasses other religious books. The internal consistency of the New Testament documents is about 99.5% textually pure.
If you are skeptical of these claims, go research it out yourself before you deny its viability of truth.
Christianity’s Claim: The Eyewitnesses are telling truth
“All Christianity asks of men on this subject, is that they would be consistent with themselves; that they would treat the evidence of other things; and that they would try and judge its actors and witnesses, as they deal with their fellow men, when testifying to human affairs and actions, in human tribunals,” writes Simon Greenleaf, one of the founders of Harvard Law School. “Let the witnesses be compared with themselves, with each other, and with surrounding facts and circumstances; and let their testimony be sifted, as if were given in a court of justice, on the side of the adverse party, the witness being subjected to a rigorous cross-examination.
“The writers of the Biblical accounts invited critical analysis, as revealed in 1 Thessalonians 5:21; 1 John 4:1; and Revelation 2:2. They wanted people to believe their testimony was true. It was imperative they provided accurate, objective and truthful information, because lives were at stake. Not just their lives, but the lives of those who received their message.
When the authors of Scripture describe events, they use specificity. In other words, only when real events are described can the details be verified and consistent. There were eyewitnesses of events such as feeding of the 5,000, 500 eyewitnesses of Jesus appearance after his death, not to mention Paul’s first hand experience with Jesus on the road to Damascus, as well as, James, Jude, John, and many many others. The authors mention all of these people as if to say, “Don’t believe me? Go talk with these first-hand witnesses yourself.” Many eyewitness were still alive when people received the letters and documents of Scripture.
“There were plenty of people around when the New Testament documents were penned who could have contested the writings. In other words, those who wrote the documents knew that if they were inaccurate, plenty of people would have pointed it out. But, we have absolutely no ancient documents contemporary with the First Century that contest the New Testament texts.”
For further reading and research, check out: http://www.tektonics.org/guest/truthfulness.htm
I also recommend CARM: http://carm.org/