[S I M T A N]

1. Is there any claim in the Bible itself that it is from God? I say no, the Bible didn't make that claim.
2. Is there a consensus on which Bible is the word of God? No, there is none. There are many Bibles with different contents. Ergo, we don't know which Bible is the word of God.
3. Is there preservation of the text? No, there is none. Corruption in the text is already a fact admitted by scholars like Bruce Metzger.
4. Is there a contradiction in the teachings? Absolutely. Plenty of contradictions and we have discussed quite a few already.
5. Is there any factual error in the Bible? Yes, like the Joseph and Pharoah story when there were no Pharoah at that time.

How you can still sit there and tell me the Bible is God's word?

We know that the Bible has been translated into lots of different languages throughout the centuries. However, the text of the Bible has been accurately preserved all the way through.

Firstly, we've plenty of manuscript evidence, both partial or complete handwritten manuscript copies of the Bible, some dating as back as the 3rd century BC. These manuscripts have allowed textual critics and scholars to verify the fact that the Bible we have today is the same Bible the early church had.

Second, we also have the writings of the church fathers, or leaders in the early church. In their commentaries on the Bible as well as in their letters to other churches, these men quoted the NT Scriptures alone countless times. Their quotations have allowed scholars to reconstruct 99.86% of the NT. There are only 11 verses in the NT which the church fathers obviously never cited.

These two evidences - the manuscript evidence and the writings of the church fathers - verify conclusively that the original text of the Bible has been accurately preserved. You can be absolutely confident that God, who inspired the men to pen the words of the Bible, saw to it that none of the inspired writings were lost. All of the NT is equally inspired (a word meaning "God breathed") and is just as authoritative as the OT Scriptures. (a word meaning "writings) We'd be foolish to think that an all-knowing, all-powerful God could lose track of books He intended to put in the Bible.