Such a book is neither out of date nor dead; and its throbbing vitality tells of a life impulse and inspiration that are not of man.
And, finally,
This book inspires men for God.
Every year books on morality and essays on conduct are written and published. They get as far as a first edition and are never heard of again; but this book, which binds all its parts about the person, the work, the office and the glories of Christ, changes the life, the character, the time and the eternity of men.
Place this book in the midst of the vilest and most abandoned community of desperate and devilish men and, sooner or later, you will hear a cry coming from the depths of sin and shame, bitter cries of repentance and yearnings after God; and by and by that community will be transformed, men will no longer be demon filled, but possessed with a spirit of truth and love; and God will be found to reign and rule in the midst.
Whatever there is of sweetness and truth and righteousness in the world to-day; whatever there is that gives hope and comfort on earth and holds men back from very madness and despair, is due directly and indirectly to this book.
Take up a map and find the lands where sin and vice skulk in the darkness; where virtue is honored and purity enthroned; go mark on the map the lands where the men are the most manly and the women the most womanly, and you will find it in those lands where the Bible is exalted, not as the word of man, but, in deed and truth, as the Word of God.
Find the men and women who know most of God, who have the deepest consciousness of him in the soul, and who walk every day with the assurance of his real presence—to whom the unseen becomes from hour to hour the thing that is alone real—and who live as kings above their prostrate passions—and they will be those who make this book the supreme authority in their daily lives; who hear it when it speaks to them as the very voice of God.
A book which thus inspires men for God is, indeed, a book which, by every law of logic, must have been inspired by God.
From the evidence cited two things are apparent: