Guest post by Paul S. Gardiner
This article presents two important, tangible reasons to have (and exhibit) a bold faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. For people who are skeptical about the divinity of Jesus and/or do not believe the 2,000-year old record of His teachings and miracles found in the Christian Bible (gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), these reasons hopefully will cause a renewed interest in Jesus and ultimately lead to belief and faith in Him as Lord and Savior. (The Bible teaches that without a Savior to atone for human sin, people will suffer God’s wrath, something most definitely to be avoided!)
Two very important reasons for a bold faith in Jesus as God’s Son are:
- recent authentication of the Shroud of Turin being the actual burial cloth of Jesus giving evidence of His bodily resurrection; and
- probability calculations showing that only Jesus could satisfy the many Biblical prophesies made hundreds of years before the birth and life of a future savior.
The Shroud of Turin
God the Creator has graciously preserved and given to humanity an astounding, miraculous, 2,000-year old gift, a precious holy relic. It is the Shroud of Turin, the recently authenticated burial cloth of Jesus Christ determined by extensive research and scientific examination to be the genuine article.
The 14.5 x 3.7 foot Shroud contains a face-up image of a man with blood stains on his forehead, wrists, side, and feet; exactly the areas of the body where the Christian Bible describes how Jesus was crucified by Roman soldiers. Below is the facial image on the Shroud:
Recent research indicates that the fabric of the Shroud is characteristic of fabrics woven in Israel during the first century and that the fabric contains microscopic residue of plants known to exist around Jerusalem.
A recent Newsmax post states: “Dr. Robert Harrington, a renowned skeptic and scientist, recently shocked his colleagues and peers when he announced his conversion to Christianity after a groundbreaking investigation into the Shroud of Turin.”
“Dr. Harrington embarked on his study of the Shroud intending to debunk its authenticity. However, as he delved deeper into the analysis, employing cutting-edge technology and methodologies, he encountered findings that challenged his scientific and personal beliefs.”
“‘I approached this study with a critical mind, ready to expose what I believed was a long-standing historical fabrication,’ Dr. Harrington explained. ‘But the evidence we uncovered was so compelling that it left no room for doubt. This is the burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth.’”
Extensive examination of the Shroud indicates, among other things, that the blood and other bodily fluids/stains on the fabric were “burned” into the fabric by a tremendous burst of energy unexplainable by scientific examination. In fact, the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP) study group that included 35 physicists, chemists, NASA image specialists, electrical engineers, a forensic pathologist, and others, determined that the Shroud’s image:
- appears to be created by an oscillating strobe of high intensity light coming from inside the body;
- the event happened in 1/40 of a billion of a second like a laser beam, moving 2.5 billion watts of electricity; to create a similar light, one would need all the electric power generated on Earth!
An in-depth discussion about the authenticity of the Shroud between Tucker Carlson and Dr. Jeremiah Johnson can be viewed here.
The Bible teaches that God resurrected Jesus from His dead body and that He then interacted with hundreds of people for another 40 days proving that He had overcome death so that people would have faith in Him and assurance of an afterlife with their Heavenly Father. At the end of the 40-day period, the Bible says that Jesus returned to Heaven to “sit at God’s right hand”.
The Shroud of Turin is a message of hope and assurance to anyone searching for meaning in life or unsure about what will happen to them (their souls) upon their earthly death. Jesus is recorded saying in John’s gospel, chapter 3, verse 16: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”. The Shroud is under protective covering in the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, Italy.
Probability Calculations
The probability calculations discussed herein are described in the book “Science Speaks” authored by mathematics and astronomy Professor Peter W. Stone and Robert C. Newman, Ph.D., Moody Press, Chicago, 1958. In his book, Professor Stone addresses the following questions: “Was the Jesus of the Bible who he claimed he was? Was he really God’s Son? Was Jesus the Messiah?”
For his initial calculations, Professor Stone used only eight of the approximately 300 biblical prophesies about Jesus and his life as follows:
a) born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2);
b) a messenger will prepare the way for him (Mal 3:1);
c) will enter Jerusalem riding on a donkey (Zech 9:9);
d) wounded in his hands by friends “(Zech 13:6);
e) betrayed for 30 pieces of silver (Zech 11:12);
f) gave 30 pieces of silver to a potter (Zech 11:13);
g) remained silent before his accusers (Isa 53:7); and
h) wicked men pierced his hands and feet “(Ps 22:16).
In evaluating a prophecy about Jesus, Professor Stone states that the question to ask is “—one man in how many men has fulfilled this prophesy?” He states further that “I realize that some will object to this question, saying that these prophecies were made with respect to Christ, and no other man has, or even can, fulfill them.
This, of course, is true when you consider the mass of prophecies regarding Christ, but it is not true of all individual prophecies.
It was prophesied, for example, that Christ would be born in Bethlehem; certainly other persons have been born in Bethlehem. It was prophesied that Christ would be crucified; other men have been crucified— I am trying to look at the evidence entirely unbiased, that I may better give a clear argument.”
Without going into the mathematical details, the end result of the probability calculations is that the chance of the above 8 prophecies all being fulfilled by one man by sheer chance is 1 in 1017 or 1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000.
And if 8 additional prophecies are added, for a total of 16, the odds of all 16 coming true in any one man by sheer chance would be 1 x 1028 x 1017 or 1 in 1045 or 1 in 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000! But miraculously, all 16 prophesies were fulfilled by Jesus!
Professor Stone states that it is overwhelmingly clear that mathematically, Jesus of Nazareth can be proven to be God’s Son, the prophesized savior.
Professor Stone concludes: “Any man who rejects Christ as the Son of God is rejecting a fact proved perhaps more absolutely than any other fact in the world.”
People place themselves in great peril by not believing the divinity of Jesus, trusting in him for the salvation of their souls, and adhering to his very beneficial teachings and rules for human conduct and life.
Paul S. Gardiner is a retired US Army officer, Vietnam veteran, and avid follower of Jesus Christ. He is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Alabama, and the US Army War College
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