Why believe the bible?

[Angrboda]

In doing various reading, I came across the following statement from Creation Ministries:

"The truth claims of theology based on sound exegesis of the biblical text (using the historical-grammatical method of interpretation upon which all meaningful human communication is based) are superior to all other competing truth claims, and scientific truth claims are only valid and reliable when they describe natural processes or phenomena where God has not chosen to directly act or intervene."

That's certainly a bold claim, that the bible itself is superior to all other truth claims. However it seems to pre-suppose believing in the truth of the bible to begin with. My question is, what reason do we have for believing in the bible in the first place?

Casting about for answers, I came across the following article, Why I Believe the Bible, which details five supposed reasons for believing the bible. I must confess I found the reasons less than persuasive. There's also this article, Why should I believe the Bible?, which attempts to answer the same question.

As best I can gather from this brief survey, the reasons are:

1. The bible says so;
   
2. The bible is internally consistent;
   
3. The bible successfully describes historical events;
   
4. The bible predicted specific archaeological discoveries;
   
5. The bible changes lives;
   
6. Jesus said to believe the bible.

Are these really the reasons why one should believe the bible? Have I missed important reasons for believing the bible? What say you, Christians? Anybody? Why do you believe the bible?

For an alternative view, one might examine Richard Carrier's recounting the history of canonization of the New Testament, The Formation of the New Testament Canon, to see how prior belief has guided the formation of, at least, the New Testament.