September 2022: Why Do I Believe God Exists?

“Jesus said, ‘Believe on the evidence.’” (John 14:11, NIV 2011)

Evidence. I am an evidentialist, a skeptical critical thinker who questions everyone’s opinions, including my own, subjecting them to critical analysis. Integrity forces me to accept what evidence and reason tell me is most likely true, whether I like that truth or not.

This characteristic can cause me stress when I encounter evidence contrary to some of my core beliefs, but I face those evidences head on. I want to believe what’s most likely true, not what makes my life easy or comfortable.

That quality gets me into trouble sometimes with family members and close friends because integrity prevents me from agreeing with them on points where I don’t see sufficient evidence to support their beliefs. I can respect them and their choices, but I can’t agree or even pretend to agree unless I see enough evidence to convince me they are most likely right. Testimonial evidence is okay if the source is credible, but I prefer empirical evidence.

Empirical Evidence. A useful definition of empirical evidence for examining the possibility of God comes from the Merriam-Webster dictionary: “originating in or based on observation or experience” (Merriam Webster 2022, Empirical). This is a very high standard of evidence that eliminates all philosophical reasoning and presuppositional trust in ancient writings, church tradition, etc. I will not claim to prove anything, but I will use empirical evidence to discover the most likely truth. In some cases, that evidence is overwhelming.

Many times, I’ve asked myself, “What if I’m wrong? Could I be mistaken?” When I go through this critical thinking process of questioning my own beliefs, deliberately doubting myself, I like to imagine the evidence for and against God on a mental balance scale. I do my best to objectively let the scale tip wherever the evidence is heavier, without bias.

God. Initially I believed God existed because my parents and other trusted adults told me so. Eventually I discovered empirical evidence for God’s existence. I’ve skeptically analyzed the evidence, looking for explanations that allow for the evidence without a god, but haven’t found any that are reasonable. Some are possible, but the possibilities are so remote I can’t take them seriously. Let me detail some of this evidence and address why some of the challenges are unlikely.

Supernatural. I’ve witnessed numerous supernatural events in my 59 years of life. Some could be explained as natural phenomenon that only appear to be miraculous works of God due to extreme coincidence. If I had a strong bias against the supernatural, I might cling to that rationalization, but as someone committed to assess evidence from an objective, neutral position, I must accept that my eye-witness observations give a very strong empirical evidence case for a good, caring, personal God. I give an account of some of these supernatural events at https://sites.google.com/site/thefarmingphysicist/my-stories/god.

I have no history of substance abuse or hallucinations that would have made me imagine these things. People who know me accept my account as solid evidence for the supernatural because they know first hand how skeptical I am and that I live by high standards of integrity. They also know first hand how gifted I am in objective analysis. I’ve verified enough points in my stories to eliminate the possibility that I could be delusional or plagued with false memories.

I’ve also heard accounts of supernatural events from friends and acquaintances who appeared credible. I’ve even studied documented accounts of supernatural events. Some of these could be hoaxes, but many come with enough credibility that I would need a strong anti-god bias to dismiss them. Lee Strobel gives an accounting of many such miracles in his book, The Case for Miracles.

These evidences of modern supernatural events fall short in demonstrating that God created the universe, but they help establish the possibility of the existence of such a god. The Bible and a few other religious texts claim that God created the universe, but that’s not good enough for me. I need evidence. No one witnessed the beginnings of the universe or our planet, so there are no testimonial accounts to rely on for evidence. I need empirical evidence. Since I’m a scientist, I look to science as a favored source of empirical evidence.

Science. As a scientist, I’ve learned to analyze evidence carefully and skeptically. Many arguments for God’s existence, such as the ontological argument and the moral argument are flawed. Some are valid, but weak. Some are very convincing. I can’t prove scientifically that a creator exists, but I can present strong evidence that a creator most likely exists.

The improbability argument. According to science we should not exist. We are astronomically improbable on so many levels, our existence seems absurd. Yet, here we are.

Let’s start with fine tuning. The initial conditions at the beginning of time singularity (commonly referred to as the big bang) need to be so finely tuned that the probability of our universe’s existence is less than one in a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion—a number with hundreds of zeros after it. (Ross 2018, 25-31, 110-111) So we have the huge bank of empirical data supporting the big bang theory on the evidence scale for creation.

Then, after this practically impossible universe somehow comes into existence, this planet we call earth, perfectly suited to sustain life, develops. Given the estimated 9-billion-year age of the universe when earth came on the scene, the probability of a planet forming that can sustain life as we know it is again, 1 in a number with hundreds of zeros after it. And that takes into consideration a possible 2 trillion galaxies in the universe (Ross 2018, 219). Add all the unique characteristics of our planet enabling life to the empirical evidence scale for creation.

Next, we need a self-replicating molecule to form by chance. The odds of this are so remote that even if earth existed with just the right conditions for trillions of years, it would still be extremely unlikely, but the earth is only a few billion years old. That self-replicating molecule would need to mutate and make an abundance of very complex molecules that interact with each other until somehow forming into a cell that can reliably reproduce itself (Strobel 2000, Chapter 3, Assembling a Cell). Now we have another practical impossibility involving a number with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of zeros. Then that cell would have to survive long enough to mutate into a variety of cells capable of adaptation to initiate the process of survival-based evolution. Again, we face astronomical odds involving numbers with hundreds, perhaps thousands of digits (Ross 2018, 220). Add organic chemistry and the complexity of DNA molecules to the empirical evidence scale for creation.

Even from that point, things look extremely improbable without an intelligent creative force. Survival of the fittest evolutionary theory proposes a logical mechanism for all life to evolve incrementally through random mutations from that first cell of life, but when we examine the details there are huge gaps in the process that intuitively seem impossible to bridge. To get from that first cellular life to the wide range of species existing today you have to faithfully embrace thousands, perhaps millions of seemingly impossible leaps in form and function within various living organisms. Incremental change through random mutation seems contrary to reality.

We have huge gaps in the fossil record where species and complex biological functions appear with no incremental steps (Strobel 2000, Chapter 3, A Primordial Detective Story). We also have biological functions of irreducible complexity—more than just a few complex organs that are challenging to explain how they could have evolved incrementally. There are thousands of functions, some large and complex such as human vision, some small and relatively simple (but still very complex on a molecular scale) such as flagellum that bacteria use to swim. Even the molecular machinery within every living cell defies imagination as to how it could evolve incrementally. Evolution simply cannot account for life because too much of it cannot be reduced to incremental change (Strobel 2000, Chapter 2, Real Acts of God; Chapter 3, A Primordial Detective Story). So now we have empirical evidence from the fossil record along with a huge chunk of anatomy, physiology, and microbiology weighing in on our evidence scale for a creator.

Creation opponents try to diminish improbabilities in our existence with speculative proposals. One is that perhaps the initial conditions at the start of the universe are fixed and never vary for any possible universe. They cannot propose any reason for this or offer any evidence to favor their speculation, but if you strongly oppose belief in a creator, it is an alternative possibility. But it only addresses the improbability of the big bang. To dismiss the improbability of life, they speculate that things might not be as improbable as they seem. Perhaps life can form under a wider range of conditions than we realize. Perhaps there are unknown forces causing planets like earth to form and encouraging the formation of life-sustaining molecules. Perhaps there are evolutionary genetic mechanisms that enable rapid leaps beyond what random mutations can do. These are attractive speculations if you have a strong bias against the concept of a creator, but the more we learn about cosmological physics and organic chemistry, the less likely these speculations appear to be possible. The long-standing trend in science pushes our existence to be constantly less likely without a creator!

A popular atheistic explanation for our improbable existence involves assuming there must be a nearly infinite number of universes. The only evidence for this assumption is that we know one universe exists, therefore others might exist. Since ours seems so ridiculously special, rather than embrace the idea that a designer made it this way, they assume ours is just one of many universes. Considering just a few more universes falls short. We need a very large number of universes, a number with millions, perhaps billions of digits, to make our existence likely. Even if that were true, it does nothing to disprove a creator. God could have created all of them.

It appears that some omnipotent being triggered creation of the universe and guided its progress for 9 billion years so earth could form, pieced together some DNA to start life, then guided the evolution of life for 3.5 billion years to bring us to where we are today. This is what science intuitively implies from the evidence. You need an irrational faith in the non-existence of a creator to believe it all happened by random chance.

Skeptics are free to reject the hypothesis of a creator if they like, but with this knowledge they can no longer claim we lack empirical evidence to support such faith. Belief in a creator is a perfectly rational conclusion to the empirical evidence. My imaginary balance scale of evidence for and against a creator drops to the creator side with a deafening thud. And we have more.

The first chapter of Genesis stands in striking contrast to all other creation myths. Nothing else comes close to it in literature style, but even more important, no other origins myth even begins to identify cosmological events or align with cosmological history as revealed by recent scientific discoveries. The authors of Genesis could not have written such a match 3000 years ago to align with cosmology revealed within the last century, unless they had supernatural assistance (Ross 2018, 23-25).

You may have noticed that I compare Genesis 1 to “other creation myths” as if Genesis 1 is also a creation myth. Scientific evidence overwhelmingly indicates that the universe is almost 14 billion years old and life on earth began more than 3 billion years ago. The hypothesis that Genesis 1 is historically and scientifically literal is unsupportable. Textual analysis indicates that Genesis 1-11 falls into a different genre than the rest of Genesis, indicating that it is neither history nor science (Longman 2012, 11). The evidence of supernatural revelation in Genesis 1 qualifies these stories as divine metaphor. Treating them as science or history leads to error.

First Cause. Science has demonstrated that nothing we observe in nature happens without a cause. Every natural event humans have ever observed resulted from some force of nature. Quantum mechanics includes the theoretical concept that matter and anti-matter can spontaneously come into existence without cause, but we have yet to observe this phenomenon. The sudden appearance of subatomic particles wouldn’t justify the sudden appearance of a universe without cause anyway. Presuming that an intelligent creative power triggered the creation singularity (also known as the big bang) is a plausible explanation. The scientific evidence that every observable event in nature has a cause favors the idea that something likely caused the universe to exist. Many theists hold this argument up as strong evidence for a creator. If I consider this argument in isolation, it seems evenly balanced between crediting God as the first cause or some unknown natural influence. In skeptical analysis I can’t justify giving God more weight than attributing it to an unknown natural influence. I need to bring in other evidences that favor a creator to tip the scale, so this one doesn’t make the cut on my does-God-exist balance scale.

I’ve seen other science-based arguments for God’s existence, but the improbability argument stands out in my mind as the strongest by far. I offer cosmology in Genesis 1 as an example of additional science-based evidence, but I don’t find it, or any other science-based argument, nearly as convincing as the improbability argument. But there are many credible evidences beyond those from science.

Organization and Beauty. Organization and beauty usually come from an intelligent source. Some believers in a creator put a lot of stock in this argument, bringing in the scientific principle of entropy and giving impressive examples. These add some credibility to the argument, but I still don’t give this one a lot of weight. There’s an element of subjectivity to it. Nature seems quite capable of organization based on the laws of physics, and beauty could be a natural byproduct of the organization in physics. But why are the laws of physics so organized and why do they create so much wonderous beauty? It makes sense that an intelligent designer made it that way.

Organization and beauty don’t provide strong evidence for me, and it’s rather subjective. If I had a biased “extreme beliefs require extreme evidence” attitude I’d throw this one out from consideration, but when I try to look at it from a neutral perspective, without bias, it tips my scale gently in favor of a Creator.

Growing Gap Trend. Astrophysics and cosmology have some gaps that our current understanding of science can’t explain. Life on earth has countless gaps that seem to defy the laws of nature and cry out for some deliberate, guiding power. Science has been filling in gaps in human understanding of nature for centuries that were formerly attributed to God, so I’m reluctant to put any God-of-the-gaps theories on my scale, but the number and difficulty of these gaps seems to be increasing with knowledge, not decreasing. This line of reasoning counts as evidence for God with many theists, but I'm not sure about it.

NDEs. Near death experiences mostly impress me as junk evidence on the same level as UFO sightings to support extra-terrestrial life. If NDEs were the only evidence for God’s existence I’d give them a skeptical dismissal. Since I’ve encountered so much evidence for God, I’ve looked into NDEs a little and found some to stand out as compelling and credible. I’m reluctant to give them much weight, but they do push the scale gently in favor of a spirit realm where the Creator-God might exist.

The main problem I have with NDEs lies in the inconsistency of the accounts. What people experience varies so wildly that they can’t be going to some common place in the spirit realm. NDE memories appear as dream-like brain activity shaped mostly by a person’s life experiences and beliefs, but there are some inexplicable distinctions that indicate something more.

In NDEs people seem self-aware that they are spirits, no longer bound to their physical bodies. People recounting NDEs frequently speak of seeing colors that human vision doesn’t perceive in the physical realm. During NDEs people sometimes perceive things in the physical world that their minds couldn’t have known such as the recent death of a friend or relative, things happening in the operating room, etc. Finally, NDEs often trigger extreme joy beyond anything the person has ever experienced in their physical life. The memory of that joy makes them long to go back. I’ve also heard accounts of individuals experiencing extreme terror, beyond anything they’ve ever experienced in life. The terror oppresses them so forcefully that they embrace religious faith with hopes of avoiding it when they face death again.

This testimonial evidence leaves me puzzled. It seems clear that people aren’t going to an actual place like heaven, but there does seem to be something supernatural happening. Perhaps our souls begin to interact with a spirit realm in some fashion when we’re near death, but since our brains are alive and interpreting the interaction from a physical world paradigm, the experience comes off as dream-like. That’s a highly speculative conjecture with enormous uncertainty. So NDEs rest on my mental balance scale in favor of a created universe, but with very little weight.

Bible Historicity. I don’t believe the Bible to be perfect or infallible, but historicity evidence strongly supports its reliability as a historical text. The evidence is so extreme as to indicate supernatural guidance in its creation and preservation. Since evidence supporting trustworthiness of the Bible supports its message that a Creator-God exists, I will summarize here.

Textual Evidence. Evidence for credibility of the Bible stands out dramatically among the world’s religious books, especially the New Testament (NT). Historians evaluate the historical reliability of ancient manuscripts by answering a variety of questions such as:

• How long after the events described was the text written?

• How close in time are the earliest manuscripts to the original writing?

• How many copies are there?

• Are the copies consistent (accurately copied)?

• How complete is the text?

• Is anything in the text validated by other manuscripts or archeology?

The NT far exceeds other ancient manuscripts in the first 5 questions and stands up to scrutiny in other methods too. The closest competitor is Homer’s Iliad and you can see below that it falls far short of the NT.

                                  Time Gap         Copies         Completeness            Accuracy

New Testament         25 years            5750                 99.5%                       99.9%

Iliad by Homer         500 years            643                    95%                           95%

(McDowell & Jones 2014, 2 -7) (Geisler 2018, paragraph 8) (Geisler 2007, 13)

Timing of when the NT was originally written is vital. We know that early copyists were meticulous in their efforts to copy these sacred writings perfectly, so the most likely time for error to enter the account is before the events were first put in writing. We know the book of Acts had to be written less than 30 years from the crucifixion of Jesus (Geiser 2007, 16) by what the text fails to mention, such as the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70. Similar techniques reliably establish dates for other NT books.

Many historical events are accepted as real based on mention by one writer. Most key events of the Gospel are recorded by 4 to 7 NT writers and many are confirmed by at least one non-Christian source such as Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, Thallus, and the Jewish Talmud.

The 7 New Testament authors all suffered persecution and most of them died defending the truthfulness of what they claim to have witnessed. No other ancient document can boast such credible evidence for the sincerity of its authors.

Archeology. Archeologists for years have been skeptical of the Bible’s historical accuracy because it seemed to contradict many of their findings, but over time, new archeological finds have validated many people, places, and events in the Bible. Many things in the Bible that had been assumed false by archeologists are slowly being proven true. (Curid, 2018)

Coherency. The Bible was written over thousands of years by extremely diverse authors, under dramatically different conditions, and in 3 different languages. You would expect such a collection of writings to be incoherent and full of contradictions, but the Bible miraculously flows into one coherent story.

Variations. Many people claim differences among the Gospel stories indicate that they are false, but the types of variations we see in the Gospels actually confirm their validity. When testimonies vary on minor details but agree on major points, that demonstrates that the testimonies are independent and credible. We may not know exactly what happened in the details with variations, but the areas of agreement are more credible because of those variations. The accounts are less likely to be a collaboration of conspirators if the stories vary on minor points (Wallace 2015).

The gospel accounts agree very effectively on all major Christian beliefs. Variations occur only on irrelevant points such as reporting how many angels were at the tomb of Jesus or whether Jairus said his daughter was dead or dying. I’m only aware of 2 variations in the entire Bible that are irreconcilable contradictions. That is astounding!

Prophecies. The Bible also contains hundreds of fulfilled prophecies. The most extraordinary prophecies were fulfilled by Jesus Christ. We have copies of the book of Isaiah dated before the birth of Jesus that describe details about the life, suffering, and death of Jesus. We have a prophecy from Daniel 9:25-26 predicting the exact day for Jesus entering Jerusalem (Palm Sunday) that has been confirmed by archaeology (J. Warner Wallace, 2019). When the NT was written, no one knew this! Recent archeological findings revealed the detailed dates demonstrating this prophecy’s fulfillment. Daniel 9:25-26 not only predicts the time Jesus would come to Jerusalem, it predicted that Jesus would be put to death. It also predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, which happened just a few decades after Jesus died.  

Empirical evidence for historical accuracy and divine inspiration of the NT is compelling, but people often dismiss the Old Testament (OT) even if they believe the NT. I think this is a mistake because evidence also supports trust in the message of the OT.

Evidence for the Old Testament. I already touched on prophecy in the OT that has been confirmed fulfilled by independent, secular, historical research. Fulfilled prophecy justifies taking the OT seriously.

Archeology also confirms a significant number of events, places, and people recorded in the historical narrative of the OT (Moles and Whitson, 2016). Knowledgeable atheists acknowledge that some the OT narrative is true. Secular historians are likely to say some if the OT is pure myth, and some is historical narrative with exaggerations and modifications. But we know the discipline practiced by ancient Hebrews in passing down oral and written history, especially concerning the Holy Scripture. We have ancient documents spanning 1000 years where only a few changes happened, and those were mostly punctuation or spelling; nothing of significant meaning changed (Moles and Whitson 2016, 47).

Distinction. Some opponents of the Bible try to connect it to local religious myths by pointing out similarities in portions of the narrative, but those similarities are minor and superficial. The Hebrew faith documented in the OT stands out with striking distinction from the religious myths of ancient people in the region or anywhere else in the world. The OT is so distinct from other ancient beliefs in so many ways as to preclude it from being a natural evolution of religious myth (Oswalt 2009, Ch 1).

On my imaginary balance scale, I now have a few evidences; some are lightweights, but some are heavyweights.

• Supernatural events

• The improbability argument

• Cosmological connections to Genesis 1

• Organization and beauty

• NDEs

• Evidences for credibility of the Bible

o   Textual analysis

o   Historicity

o   Archeology

o   Coherence

o   Variations

o   Prophecy

o   Distinction

Evidence Against God. Now I need to put evidence against God’s existence on the other side of the scale to see which carries the most weight.

Age of the Universe, Earth, and Life. The main solid empirical evidence against Christianity comes from science. This overwhelming body of evidence proves beyond all reasonable doubt that the universe, planet earth, and life are billions of years old, not less than 10,000 years as calculated by some Biblical scholars. Describing all the evidence would require numerous encyclopedic volumes so I just list a few categories of science and identify some of the evidences in those disciplines.

1. Cosmology: Cosmic expansion rate, cosmic cooling rate, cosmic background radiation, rate of formation of celestial bodies, cosmic density

2. Physics: radioactive decay, redshift velocities, magnetic field measurements

3. Chemistry: formation of large atoms, relative abundances of hydrogen/deuterium/helium

4. Geology: age of rocks, layers in the earth’s crust, plate tectonics

5. Paleontology: fossil records

6. Archeology: signs of ancient human life

7. Biology: evolution

This list could be much longer, but it’s already sufficient. Some theories in this list have uncertainty issues, most notably evolution, but those uncertainties fall short in challenging the billions of years age for the universe, earth, and life. Data from all these disciplines of science fit together very nicely under the billions of years paradigm. None of them work with a timeline anywhere near 10,000 years.

The weight of this data alone overwhelms the evidence I presented for God if I believed young-earth theology was necessary for God’s existence. I’ve known a few dogmatic young-earth Christians who take that position, but I find it quite absurd and irrational. For me, a Christian who recognized the metaphorical nature of Genesis 1-11 when I was only 13-years-old, none of this evidence holds any weight against a creator. It overwhelms young-earth theology, but it doesn’t land on my imaginary balance scale for or against a creator at all. It’s irrelevant because I reject the young-earth theology.

World-wide Flood. The world-wide flood described in Genesis 6-9 would have left a huge geological impact—layers of intermingled fossilized life forms, evidence of world-wide salt water contamination, massive movements of sediment all occurring at once, etc. The absence of evidence that should be there is overwhelming. The possibility of a large regional flood is scientifically viable, but not a global flood. Since the Biblical account of a world-wide flood falls in the metaphorical genre of Genesis 1-11, this evidence also fails to carry any weight on my does-god-exist balance scale. It’s irrelevant to God’s existence, but it weighs heavily against young-earth theology.

Archaeology. I mentioned earlier that archaeology supports accepting the Bible as historical documentation. Some archaeology contradicts details in the Bible. The further back in time we go, the greater the disconnect seems to be. Even though the trend in archaeological discovery has been favoring biblical accuracy, there are still significant issues. Persistent disconnects between archaeology and the Bible weigh against the traditional theology that the Bible is the perfect, inerrant word of God even though areas of agreement support a level of historical reliability in the Bible. Archeological disconnects land on the opposing side of the scale weighing against evidence favoring biblical credibility.

Insertions. Scholars agree that some short passages in the NT were added after the original writing. These insertions do not contradict other Biblical content so they could be accurate oral histories that someone simply inserted. For skeptics, these insertions lack credibility and cast doubts on the concept if divine authorship. These insertions land on the opposing side of the scale weighing against evidence favoring biblical credibility, but they don’t really carry a lot of weight.

Archeology and insertions carry significant weight against people who claim the Bible is God’s perfect, infallible word, but I’m not in that camp. Evidence indicates that the Bible is a reliable source of information about ancient history and even appears to have been supernaturally protected. If biblical perfection and infallibility were key to my belief in a creator, archeology and insertions would pose a significant problem, but as an evidentialist I don’t subscribe to that presuppositional “the Bible is God’s perfect infallible word” view, so these issues aren’t much concern to me. Still, I put them on the scale as evidences against God because they weaken the Bible’s force in favor of God.

Conclusion. Looking at my imaginary balance scale, I now have on the side favoring a Creator:

• Supernatural events

• The improbability argument

• Cosmological connections to Genesis 1

• Organization and beauty

• NDEs

• Evidences for credibility of the Bible

o   Textual analysis

o   Historicity

o   Archeology

o   Coherence

o   Variations

o   Prophecy

o   Distinction

and opposing a creator:

• Archeology

• Biblical insertions

Clearly the does-god-exist balance pushes my scale in favor of a creator with a resounding thud.

This is my mental balance scale, driven by evidences with rather subjectively assigned weights. Some people give evidences in favor of a creator so much weight that evidence against a creator is thrown off their mental scale. They live with complete confidence in their eternal hope, doubt free. Other people with anti-god bias resist giving creator-evidence any weight. Some refuse to even call it evidence. Their scale is permanently tipped against the creator with a strong thumb of bias. I’ve done my best to weigh the evidence objectively and face uncertainty with integrity. I have to live with doubts, but I still have a strong hope that a benevolent creator exists and offers joy to all who repent of selfishness, seeking love.

Reference List

Holy Bible, New International Version. (2011). Biblica Inc. (Original work published 1973) https://www.biblegateway.com/

Currid, John D. (2018). 10 Crucial Archeological Discoveries Related to the Bible, Crossway. https://www.crossway.org/articles/10-crucial-archaeological-discoveries-related-to-the-bible/

Deemer, Roger. (2017). The Farming Physicist, My Stories, God, GoogleSites. https://sites.google.com/site/thefarmingphysicist/my-stories/god

Geisler, Norm. (2007). A Popular Survey of the New Testament. Baker

Geisler, Norman. (2018). Has the Bible Been Accurately Copied Down Through the Centuries?, Southern Evangelical Seminary & Bible College. https://ses.edu/has-the-bible-been-accurately-copied-down-through-the-centuries/McDowell, Josh D., & Jones, Clay. (2014). The Bibliographical Test, https://www.josh.org/wp-content/uploads/Bibliographical-Test-Update-08.13.14.pdf, (Adapted from an earlier article by Clay Jones, The Bibliographical Test Updated, Christian Research Journal, Vol. 35, no. 2 (2012).)

Longman, Tremper, III. (2012). Introducing the Old Testament, Zondervan

Merriam-Webster. (2022). Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Merriam-Webster. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/empirical

Moles, Dennis and Whitson, Ryan. (2016). Reasons to Believe, Aneko Press

Ross, Hugh. (2018). The Creator and the Cosmos: How the Latest Scientific Discoveries Reveal God, 4th Edition, RTB Press

Strobel, Lee. (2000). The Case for Faith. Zondervan.

Strobel, Lee. (2018). The Case for Miracles, Zondervan.

Wallace, J. Warner. (2015). Why We Should Expect Witnesses to Disagree, Cold-Case Christianity. https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/why-we-should-expect-witnesses-to-disagree/

Wallace, J. Warner. (2019). Perhaps the Greatest Old Testament Prophecy of All, Cold-Case Christianity. https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/perhaps-the-greatest-old-testament-prophecy-of-all/