Hitchhikers’ Galaxy Guide
© Copyright 2002,  Stephen M. Crotts
(Author copyright credit constitutes permission for non-profit copying)

          There are approximately 733,746 words in the Bible.

          It was written over a span of 1,600 years.  Some 40 different authors penned its pages--from Moses writing in North Africa about 1500 B.C. to the Apostle John writing off the coast of Turkey around 100 A.D.

          Its authors came from every walk of life:  kings (Song of Solomon),  peasants, blue collar workers (I and II Peter), philosophers (Job), poets (Psalms), statesmen (Daniel), herdsmen (Amos), scholars (Paul’s letters, Romans), a physician (Luke), and even a military man (Joshua).

          The Bible was written on three different continents: Asia, Africa and Europe.

          It was written by men in various situations--from great pain to wedded bliss.  Moses wrote from the desert, Jeremiah from a dungeon, Daniel from a palace, Paul from jail, and John from a tiny island called Patmos.

          Scripture was written in three different languages: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. 

          All this and yet its ideas read as if there is one mind behind it all revealing the Good News of God’s divine redeeming strategy for lost humanity.

          Some of the Bible is poetry.  Some is history.  Other parts are prophecy, wisdom, literature or theology.

          The word “bible” comes from the Greek “biblia” and means library or books.  Actually the Bible is not one book but a collection of books: 39 Old Testament books and 27 New Testament, making for a total of 66.

          The Bible was laboriously hand copied by monks for hundreds of years.  Then with Gutenberg’s press in 1456, it became the first printed book.

          Today it has been translated into over 1,300 different languages.

          It is the all time best seller.

          It holds the record for the most paid for any book when in 1933 the British bought a Bible manuscript from Sinai for over one half million dollars.  It is the most heavily studied and criticized book.  Scholars have subjected it to literary criticism, historical criticism, form criticism, redaction criticism, and even computer analysis.  As Bernard Ramm has put it, “A thousand times over, the death knell of the Bible has been sounded, the funeral procession formed, the inscription cut on the tombstone, and the committal read.  But somehow the corpse never stays put.”

          Its message has changed lives, founded universities, spawned orphanages, retirement homes, hospitals, inspired art, music, novels and poetry, laid the legal foundation for the western world and given impetus to science, even abated a plague.

          Parts of it at least 3,500 years old, the Bible still has the power to lay claim on ones’ life, prick the conscience, edify, warn, correct, make wise, give insight, and steer into a secure relationship with Christ.

          Henry David Thoreau said,  “A truly good book teaches me better than to read it.  I must soon lay it down and commence living on its hint...what I began by reading I must finish by acting.”  And such a book is the Bible.  Never meant merely to entertain, it was written to motivate all people everywhere to respond to the living God by faith, wrap their flesh around the Good News of His forgiving, empowering love, and go serve humanity in the world.

          And for nearly 3,500 years scripture has been doing just that.

          Today why not open your Bible, let its pages introduce you to the Lord, and get started on the greatest adventure of your life--serving with God.