The World's Greatest Truths: Part 1 and Part 2

By James Bramlett, Lt. Colonel USAF (Ret)

This book is about "the world's greatest truths," but it's really about just one Person. According to the Bible, truth is not an abstraction. Truth is a Person. Jesus said, "I am the truth." I hope you have found Him in these pages.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
• Release date: May 25, 2018
• ISBN: 9781640034471

Book preview

Prologue

This book contains the basic and essential truths that every human being should know. Without a doubt, they are really the world’s greatest truths.

If you are a human being, you definitely should know them.

All these truths share one amazing trait—simplicity. The average person can read about 200 to 250 words in one minute. Surprisingly, the average person can read, understand, and where appropriate, act upon each of the world’s greatest truths in about one minute or less!

Accordingly, each chapter has a one-minute summary in case you are really in a hurry and for quick reviews. In addition, appendix I contains one-minute answers to the world’s greatest questions.

The one-minute concept in this book is revolutionary, yet thousands of years old. It proves anew that the deepest and most profound truths in the world can be quickly communicated and understood. Of course, it takes a little longer to explain why they are true and how they work, which each chapter does. But you will enjoy the explanations, which are surely worth a few extra minutes of your time.

Just knowing these truths will make you wise, actually wiser than many highly educated people. By reading and understanding these truths, you will attain the highest level of intellectual awareness of the meaning of life.

The information in this small book has been described as more valuable than choice gold.¹ It can benefit you daily for your entire life, and even afterwards. Sound incredible? But it’s true.

These may be the most important few minutes you will ever spend.

Enjoy!

Acknowledgments

Special appreciation is extended to the following:

Mark W. Wilson, MA, for his assistance in editing and input on some of the technical areas.

Robert A. McDonough, President of McDonough Media, Chesapeake, Virginia, for his valuable assistance and recommendations.

The hundreds of diligent and faithful scholars whose study and conclusions have shed light on these greatest truths.

Those friends with whom I shared the concept and need for this book and who caught the vision with me. The vision will not tarry.

My dear and saintly wife, Violeta, who patiently tolerates my many hours at the computer and is always a blessing and encouragement.

Introduction

Here’s a shocking story I once read that dramatically affected my life:

Several years ago, there was a politician who was a very busy person. He was so busy that he didn’t even have a minute to spare. He was really busy.

One day, he was rushing out of a meeting and on his way to another meeting when a newspaper reporter approached him. Excuse me, sir, the reporter asked, can you spare just one minute?

The politician hurriedly replied, Sorry, but I couldn’t spare one minute for Jesus Christ right now.

Just a minute later, he was assassinated.

End of story? Unfortunately not. The politician suddenly found himself in eternity, with all the time in the world, and then some—actually, forever.

Frankly, that’s always bothered me. He said he could not even spare one minute for Jesus Christ and he may be out there in eternity somewhere, alone, without Christ. It’s really scary when you stop to think about it.

This story did get me to thinking. It made me realize that modern people are incredibly busy. We don’t have time for anything. It’s always rush, rush, rush. Almost nobody, it seems, has enough time, said a front-page newspaper article from a nationwide New York Times News Service wire.¹

And it’s the supersonic age. We don’t always know where we are going, but we’re in a hurry to get there.

Because we are so busy and in such a hurry, we must have an instant everything: instant coffee, instant breakfast, TV dinners, microwave meals, quick weight loss, instant car washes, jiffy lubes, instant credit, crash courses, ad infinitum.

There must be a divinely ordained division of time—one minute—because that’s what everything seems to take. Why does it seem like most anything can be done in one minute? Maybe that’s just how the universe is constructed. It’s probably a good idea because that’s about all the time we have to devote to anything. There’s even a one-minute manager and a one-minute salesperson (the books by those names actually inspired this book).

The politician’s sudden and unexpected tragedy also has caused me to study the profound questions: What is really important in life? I mean really.

What are the world’s greatest truths? And in addition, How long does it take to learn them: days, weeks, months, maybe years?

Well, after years of study, I finally discovered the truths. But after I spent all that time I was shocked to discover that each can be learned in about sixty seconds or less! It may sound hard to believe, but it’s a fact, and I’ll prove it to you. Real truth is simple; it’s people who complicate things.

For this reason, I have developed a modern packaging of these ancient truths and designed them specifically for the modern man or woman, the twentieth-century person on the move and who is always in a hurry.

If you are really busy, but unlike the poor politician, you are willing to devote at least one minute to something truly important, this book is for you.

Yes, for you—rushed, hurried, harried, anxious, yet worried about the meaning of life, and the future—I excitedly present:

The World’s Greatest Truths

and I unflinchingly include this claim and guarantee:

This book will show you how you can, in just one minute, do something that will give you instant and permanent approval by the Creator of the universe! Incredible? But true. If you follow the One-Minute Procedure later in this book, you can be assured of God’s special blessings for all eternity. Otherwise, you can obtain a refund of the full purchase price of this book (if returned in good condition).

Don’t scoff. I’m serious. You will be pleasantly surprised at what you discover in the following pages. You will probably never be the same.

There is one secret that makes all this possible. I can’t take any credit for it. It’s been around for thousands of years. It’s really nothing new. But I will tell you what it is. It is, without a doubt, the world’s greatest secret. Surprisingly, this secret has affected millions and millions of people. It has affected the course of empires, and it has changed history.

I will also tell you how this secret and actually all the truths in this book are based on the world’s greatest substance, and how this miraculous substance is the mysterious link between Judaism and Christianity. Someday both Jews and Christians will see and marvel over this link together.

Why such a big secret, and how do I know about it? Well, the only reason it may be a secret now is that truth often becomes obscured over time and by tradition. Sometimes we humans put layers and layers of our own ideas upon basic truths until they are unrecognizable. That’s what has happened. But the world’s greatest truths goes to the original source to bring you the undiluted, untampered truth!

These truths are so simple and wonderful, it’s almost too good to be true. But it is. Actually, millions of people constantly refer to them as amazing.²

They really are amazing, and true. I will bet my life on it.

Can you spare just one minute?

PART 1

Chapter 1

The World’s Greatest Book

It is the bestseller of all time, of all books anywhere. It is referred to as the Book of books.

It has been translated into more languages than any book in the world—as of the year 2002, at least parts of it into over 2,300 languages! It is even believed to be the first book ever translated, from Hebrew to Greek.

We call the book, simply, the Bible. The word Bible means books. Actually, the Bible is a collection of books—sixty-six of them, written by some forty authors.

Every valid belief must have a factual basis. There are millions of opinions on almost any subject, but they are only uninformed and meaningless unless they are rooted in fact. The Bible is the root source of the faith of the plurality of the world’s population. This raises a major question . . .

Is the Bible trustworthy? This may be the world’s greatest question. Is it a factual revelation of the Creator of the universe, or just a collection of human opinions and myths?

Are there objective reasons why millions of people, including many thousands of scholars, believe in the Bible’s reliability, or is it just a matter of blind faith? You need to know. The entire validity of Judaism, which is based on the Old Testament, and Christianity, which is based on both the Old and New Testaments, rests upon the answer.

If it is not trustworthy, it is the greatest hoax ever fostered upon the human race and deserves our total scorn. If it is trustworthy, it demands our utmost attention and respect. Only one attitude is incomprehensible—indifference, to strangely ignore the possibility that the Bible may contain the exclusive answers to this life and the next, as it claims.

Interestingly, most people, even the indifferent, have an opinion on the subject, although it is often based on emotion or hearsay. But surprisingly few have systematically examined the evidence, or even read it.

I once asked myself this question and then spent the next twenty-five years discovering the answer. I’ll tell my conclusion, then in just one minute, I will summarize the extensive research generally agreed upon by thousands of scholars.

Is the Bible trustworthy? You will find out.

The Bible Is Unique

Scholars who have studied the sacred writings of the various religions report that the Bible is unique and distinctive for many reasons. Here are a few:

It was written over a period of about 1,600 years, or about forty generations.

It was written in different places on three different continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe.

It was written in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek.

Its forty authors were from different walks of life, including kings, fishermen, scholars, statesmen, and peasants.

It includes hundreds of subjects.

Yet with the above incredible diversity, it has an amazing unity. This continuity and consistency (along with other characteristics and content as described below) make the Bible logically beyond human ability to accomplish. The presence and influence of an external Guiding Hand are necessary.

The Bible Claims Itself to be Divinely Inspired

A major and unique aspect of the Bible is its own consistent claim to be divinely inspired. The Bible claims itself to be the Word of God. But more than claiming divine inspiration, in the Bible God even speaks in the first person! Expressions such as And God said . . . followed by a quote appear about 3,800 times in the Old Testament alone.

These claims and characteristics are in a book that espouses truth, morality, and all that is good. It is illogical that it would be a hoax, and a conspiracy is impossible because of the vast differences in time and place of the writers and events. Also, of the large number of people involved, someone would have surely squealed, a victim of the good conscience he preached. But beyond logic, there are other objective reasons that argue for the divine inspiration of the Bible.

Prophecy Confirms the Bible’s Truth

Prophecy, or the prediction of future events, gives the Bible an internal authenticity. This is one of the great marvels of the Bible, one that distinguishes it from all other writings. Prophets spoke under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit about future events, especially concerning Israel, the nations, the Messiah, and the church. The events have occurred without fail as they were predicted.

Unlike modern-day psychics whose track record on predictions is, at best, usually no more than chance would provide, the ancient Hebrew prophets could not make a mistake. They were 100 percent accurate, the only such group in the history of the world. This confirms the divine origin of their information. Through them, God revealed His plans, and they wrote it as they were inspired.

For example, about six hundred years before Christ, the prophet Ezekiel predicted details about the destruction of the city of Tyre.² Its destruction by Nebuchadnezzar came just a few years later. History has shown the prophecy’s amazing details to have happened: Tyre became a bare rock where fishermen spread their