GOD'S ANCIENT JIGSAW PUZZLE

Do you like jigsaw puzzles? Some folks love putting them together, but I'm not one of them. People willing to concentrate enough to assemble 1,000 or 1,500 piece puzzles have a patience I surely don't have. 

How about solving a 19,000 piece puzzle that contains four languages? The last two Sundays I've been leading a video and discussion Bible Class at our congregation called, "How We Got the Bible." It's offered by the Lutheran Hour Ministries and features Dr. Paul Maier and others. 

In Sunday's segment Dr. Joel Lampe, manager of The Bible Museum in Goodyear, Arizona, gave fascinating information about the Dead Sea Scrolls. He said that in the Qumran caves along the Dead Sea they found 19,000 fragments of the Old Testament writings in four languages: Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic and Nabataean. It took many experts 60 years, but they finally assembled the pieces into 961 Old Testament writings. They even used DNA testing to match some of the pieces.

The scribes of Qumran were the ancient printing press. They faithfully and carefully copied old and worn Old Testament books onto new parchment scrolls and papyrus pages, and then, out of respect, buried the old texts in jars in the caves. 

The most amazing aspect of the DSS was not their condition but their content. When compared to oldest Greek and Hebrew texts we have today, they are virtually the same. The few tiny differences found do not change the meaning of the text. God's people had done their best to make sure they didn't change what they were copying. As old Professor A. C. Streufert often said to us in class, "The Word of God survives translation!"

I look forward to leading the last two sessions of "How We Got the Bible." It's estimated that since Gutenberg's first Bible was printed in 1455, there have been six billion copies of the Bible printed in hundreds of languages. Thirty million Bibles are still sold each year. No other book in history has even printed one billion copies. God's Word is the best seller of all times. 

And well it should be. The Bible contains the most important information of all times. The Old Testament points forward to the coming Savior of the world, and the New Testament points backward to Jesus of Nazareth as being that promised Savior. The message of the Bible is not about history or behavior, but Jesus our Savior. God made sure His Book would survive with His precious Gospel message of forgiveness.

Thank You, Lord, for giving us the Bible with its life-giving message. Amen