1. The truth of the things contained in the sacred writings. It requires that a book professing to be a revelation from God should contain truth, and nothing but truth: such particularly must be its history, its prophecies, its miracles, and its doctrines. Now, as the Scriptures abound with these, if they be untrue, it can be no difficult undertaking to prove them so. The facts being stated, with the evidence accompanying them, it lies upon those who disbelieve them to show cause. It certainly has not been for want of adversaries, nor of adversaries of talent, that this work has never been accomplished. How is it that, out of all those who have written against the Bible, not an individual has soberly and modestly undertaken to answer the evidence which has been adduced for the veracity of its history, the fulfilment of its prophecies, the reality of its miracles, and the purity and consistency of its doctrines? Instead of this, many of them have meanly pretended to believe the Bible, while yet they have been deceitfully undermining it; and those who have avowed their hostility have commonly dealt in ridicule, rather than in reason. Verily, it is to the honour of the Bible to have such men for its adversaries.

2. Their consistency. A book written by more than thirty men, of different talents and stations in life, living in different ages, the greater part of whom, therefore, could have no communication with each other, must, had it not been written under the inspiration of God, have been full of contradictions. Let any other production be named which has preserved a consistency under such circumstances. To suppose a succession of writings, the work of designing impostors, or at least of weak-headed fanatics, capable of maintaining that harmony which is apparent in the sacred Scriptures, is no less absurd than the notion of Epicurus, that the world was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, without a designing cause. Great as are the differences between Jews and Christians, there is none between their sacred writings. The Old and New Testaments are dictated by one and the same Spirit. Paul was hated by his unbelieving countrymen, and treated as an apostate from the religion of his ancestors; but he was not an apostate. “I thank God,” says he to Timothy, “whom I serve from my forefathers.” He speaks also of the same faith which was in Timothy as having dwelt first in his grandmother Lois, and then in his mother Eunice; the former of whom lived and died under the former dispensation. The same God who, “at sundry times and in divers manners, spoke in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,” in the “last days spoke unto us by his Son.” Consistency, it is true, may not in every instance be a test of truth; since error and falsehood may, in some particulars, be made to agree: but, in a subject whose bearings are multifarious and minute, they cannot escape detection; nothing but truth in such cases will be found consistent throughout.

3. Their perfection. If the Bible be of God, perfection must be one of its properties; for “He is a Rock, and his work is perfect.” This property, however, belongs to it, not as having been begun and ended at once. This the work of creation was not; each day had its proper work; which, on review, was pronounced very good, and all together, when finished, formed a glorious whole. Such was the work of inspiration: the sacred Scriptures were upwards of fifteen hundred years from their commencement to their completion; but, being completed, they form a whole, and every part of them is very good. There is this peculiar property belonging to the sacred Scriptures, that if you are in possession of only a single book, you may generally learn from it the leading principles which run through all the rest. The strong language of David concerning the sacred Scriptures, such as their being “more to be desired than thousands of gold and silver, sweeter than honey and the honey-comb,” and the like, could have reference to little more than the Pentateuch of Moses. Even a leaf from the sacred oracles would, in innumerable instances, teach him that should find it, and read it with a humble mind, the way to everlasting life; and this not as possessing any thing like a charm, but as containing principles which, if understood and followed, will lead the inquirer to God.

4. Their pungency. There is nothing in the sacred Scriptures to gratify an idle curiosity; but much that commends itself to the conscience, and that interests the heart They are a mirror, into which he that seriously looks must, in a greater or less degree, see his own likeness, and discover what kind of character he is. That which was said of Jesus by the Samaritan woman, might be said of them, in thousands of instances: “He told me all that ever I did.” They are “the words of the wise, which are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies.” They not only prick the sinner in his heart, but stick so fast that he is incapable of extracting them. It has been remarked, that they who heard the preaching of the apostles were generally moved by it, either to repent and be-converted, or to oppose the truth with bitter resentment. Their doctrine was a savour of life unto life in them that believed, and of death unto death in them that resisted. Surely, if we preached more in the spirit and power of the apostles, the effects of our ministry would more resemble theirs, and our hearers would not be able to sit year after year easy in their sins. “The word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword; piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow; and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” If our preaching be but little adapted to produce these effects, surely it contains but little of the word of God.

5. Their utility. There is much in the sacred Scriptures that is entertaining and pleasing to the ingenious, and more to console the sorrowful: it was not, however, to please, nor merely to comfort, but to profit us that they were written. That which is given by inspiration of God is “profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” Unbelievers may declaim against the Bible; but universal experience proves that, in respect of the present life only, they who believe it, and form their lives on its principles are, beyond all comparison, the best members of society; while they who disbelieve and traduce it are the worst. And if to this be added the life to come, it is no longer a subject of comparison, but of contrast; for the former ordinarily die in peace and hope, the latter either blinded by insensibility, or, if awakened to reflection, in fearful forebodings of the wrath to come.

 Fuller, A. G. (1988). The Complete Works of Andrew Fuller: Memoirs, Sermons, Etc. (J. Belcher, Ed.; Vol. 1, pp. 699–701). Sprinkle Publications.