Credible

I love the narrative integrity of Scripture. It is blunt. It is realistic about sin. It is candid about suffering. It is brutally honest about the people of God failing. It features flawed protagonists who are completely dependent on God's grace (e.g. King David, a man after God's own heart, plots murder to cover up his adultery). It talks about God repeatedly pursuing a people who can't even remember Him. It talks about a wayward people who keep returning to their idols but are somehow still first in God's heart. It includes so many "unnecessary" details that give me confidence in its veracity. It tells me the number of pomegranates carved into the pillars of the temple [1 Kings 7], or that a young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus but runs away naked after being seized [Mark 13]. It details the genealogy of Jesus with painstaking precision [Matt. 1]. It records events that someone would not think to make up: "Even after Jesus had performed so many signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him." [John 12:37]. In a time when women could not even testify in courts, women were the first eyewitnesses of the risen Christ. I love Scripture, because it extends hope that is credible.

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