Episode 110: "The Eye of the Beholder," Dr. Lydia McGrew Defends the Reliability of John's Gospel [Part 2]

At Watchman Fellowship, our staff is routinely exposed to the objections about the Bible from skeptics and atheists. Such objections often include arguments against the historical reliability of the New Testament. It seems those objections become even more intensified over the historical reliability of the Gospel of John. Critics often ask of John: If Jesus really said what John reports, why don’t we find those same statements in the other three Gospel accounts? Why is John so different than the other Gospels? Did the apostle John really write the gospel attributed to him? Are the Jesus’ statements recorded in John actually what Jesus said or were based on later interpretations created by an anonymous community of followers of John? Unfortunately, these concerns and suspicions surrounding John’s Gospel don’t just come from atheists and skeptics critics but also from some Christian scholars. So what can those of us not versed in the critical scholarship of John do? Are we hopelessly tossed about in a sea of scholarly criticism, skeptical objections and textual ambiguities? Absolutely not for John himself intentions in writing about his personal experiences with the Lord Jesus “written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and I believe in you may have life in his name.” This is the conclusion of a two-part episode of Apologetics Profile. Our staff apologist, Daniel Ray, talks with Dr. Lydia McGrew about her new book defending the historicity and reliability of the Gospel of John. It is entitled, The Eye of the Beholder: The Gospel of John as Historical Reportage.Dr. Lydia McGrew is a widely published analytic philosopher and author. She received her PhD in English from Vanderbilt University in 1995. She has published extensively in the theory of knowledge, specializing in formal epistemology and in its application to the evaluation of testimony and to the philosophy of religion. She defends the reliability of the Gospels and Acts in her books Hidden in Plain View: Undesigned Coincidences in the Gospels and Acts, The Mirror or the Mask: Liberating the Gospels From Literary Devices, and most recently The Eye of the Beholder: The Gospel of John as Historical Reportage.ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:  Book - The Eye of the Beholder: The Gospel of John as Historical Reportage by Dr. Lydia McGrew: https://amzn.to/3JBwISz Book - The Mirror or the Mask: Liberating the Gospels from Literary Devices by Dr. Lydia McGrew: https://amzn.to/3h06xZE Follow Lydia McGrew's author page on Facebook: facebook.com/LydiaMcGrewAuthor SUPPORT: Help us create more content like this. Make a tax-deductible donation here: www.watchman.org/give.Apologetics Profile is a ministry of Watchman FellowshipFor more information visit www.watchman.org © Watchman Fellowship, Inc.