Last week Joshua Michael Smith began sharing his testimony from childhood to his college years when he changed his mind about Jesus’s identity. In part two he talks about cage stage unitarianism–where one seeks to confront everyone about this important truth regardless of their interested or antagonism. Smith shares how he matured while continuing to Read more about 559 Youth Ministry Matters (Joshua Michael Smith)[…]
Christians have approached the first chapter of Genesis differently over the centuries. There are those who hold to young earth creationism, day-age theory, gap theory, and progressive creationism, just to name a few. Oftentimes defenders of a particular view will provide biblical, scientific, and historical evidence for their position. Our focus today is on the Read more about 556 Recruiting Ancients for the Creation Debate (Andrew Brown)[…]
This is part 6 of the Early Church History class. In the latter half of the second century, two kinds of Christians arose to defend the faith. On the one hand, apologists wrote defenses of Christianity directed at the Roman government. They responded to rumors, arguing that Christians were decent people who should be shown Read more about 486 Early Church History 6: Apologists & Heresy Hunters[…]
How do you engage with culture? Are you aware of how culture is shaping your sensibilities about meaning, power, morality, religion, and aesthetics? Do you blindly reject everything in the culture so that you can remain separate from the world or do you blindly accept everything so that you remain relevant? My guest today is Read more about 480 Interpreting Your World (Justin Bailey)[…]
What do we do when the science in the bible seems wrong by today’s standards, but typical for their world? For example, those who believe in a flat earth often point to scripture as evidence for their belief. Indeed the bible arguably does contain some texts that imply a flat earth. But, if the Hebrew Read more about 479 Scripture & Science 16: Science in the Bible (Will Barlow)[…]
What is a miracle? Does it mean God breaks the laws of physics or merely that he intervenes within the system? After considering several definitions of miracles from Christian thinkers, Will Barlow interacts with a number of biblical incidents to explain what a miracle is and is not. He examines the parting of the Red Read more about 475 Scripture & Science 14: What Are Miracles? (Will Barlow)[…]
Having looked at the basics of earth science last time, we are now ready to consider Noah’s Flood. As always you’ll learn the major options for interpreting this biblical event. Some Christians understand the flood to have been a local event, largely limited to the region of Mesopotamia. Others hold to the notion that this Read more about 474 Scripture & Science 13: Noah’s Flood (Will Barlow)[…]
I’d like to take an opportunity to interrupt this Scripture and Science class. We’ve just done three episodes on evolution. The first one covered the basics of what evolution is. Our second teaching evolution covered biblical problems and the third surveyed some scientific problems. Then Will interviewed Sam about his beliefs in both Christianity and Read more about 472 Why I (Still) Don’t Believe in Evolution (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Since it’s inception, evolutionary theory has remained controversial for many. Although one might think only uneducated laypeople find the idea unpalatable, quite a sizeable minority of scientists too struggle to come to terms with Darwinism. In today’s episode, Will Barlow explores a number of major scientific objections to evolution, including the Cambrian explosion, mutations as Read more about 471 Scripture & Science 11: Scientific Objections to Evolution (Will Barlow)[…]
Having looked at what the theory of evolution teaches last time, today we’re going to think through how well evolution fits with the bible. Will Barlow covers two main scriptural objections that young earth creationists bring against evolution before exploring three more issues that arise from the perspective of old earth creationism. How does Genesis Read more about 470 Scripture & Science 10: Biblical Objections to Evolution (Will Barlow)[…]
This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, parts 6-8. If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 464 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan asks Will Barlow about light, relativity, quantum theory, the big Read more about Why is our universe SO finely tuned to support life?[…]
This episode rounds out three sessions focused on physics. Today we’re learning about the incredibly precise conditions required for life to exist in our universe. From the strength of gravity to the properties of carbon or water to the beauty of math and the stars, Pastor Will Barlow enumerates several key ways in which the Read more about 466 Scripture & Science 8: Fine-Tuning (Will Barlow)[…]
Building on last week, Will Barlow continues to describe and analyze issues with the Big Bang Theory. He considers standard biblical and scientific objections brought forward by young earth creationists. After responding to these objections, he shows how each of the main Christian views of origins deals with the Big Bang. Listen to this episode Read more about 465 Scripture & Science 7: Genesis and the Big Bang[…]
Now that we’ve considered a bunch of the options for interpreting creation in Genesis, we are moving to look at astronomy. In today’s episode Will Barlow moves into his home territory–physics. You’ll learn about the weird nature of light, how particles do strange things at the quantum scale, and how the big bang model actually Read more about 464 Scripture & Science 6: Physics and Astronomy (Will Barlow)[…]
This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 5: Reading on Genesis One (3). If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 463 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan asks Will Barlow about the Read more about Is the Gap Theory the best option?[…]
This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 4: Reading on Genesis One (2). If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 462 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan asks Will Barlow about old-earth Read more about Does Old-Earth, Day-Age Creationism Work?[…]
We’ve been considering the various options for interpreting the creation account in Genesis. Last time we looked at two young earth theories and today we’ll survey three old earth perspectives, including the day age theory, modified day-age theory, and a non-literal approach. For each Will Barlow explains the basics and offers a gentle critique. Listen Read more about 462 Scripture & Science 4: Reading Genesis One, Part 2 (Will Barlow)[…]
This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 3: Reading on Genesis One (1). If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 460 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan and Will Barlow discuss how Read more about Young Earth Creationism, Distant Starlight, James Webb Telescope[…]
Have you heard of the Gospel of Thomas? What about the Gospel of Philip or Judas? Although most Christians are only familiar with the four Gospels contained in the Bible, ancient Christians wrote quite a few other Gospels as well. How do we know which Gospels are to be trusted? My guest today is Dr. Read more about 461 The Gospel and the Gospels (Simon Gathercole)[…]
Today we’ll begin to consider interpretive options for the first chapter of Genesis. We’ll see three main groupings of theories, including those that propose a young earth of only thousands of years, those that see the earth as old (billions of years), and those that are compatible with either. After introducing the main options, Will Read more about 460 Scripture & Science 3: Reading Genesis One, Part 1 (Will Barlow)[…]
This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 2: Background on Genesis One. If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 459 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan and Will Barlow discuss how the Read more about Science, Inspiration, and Flat-Earth Discussion[…]
This is a followup discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 1: What Is a Belief System. If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 458 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Sean Finnegan and Will Barlow discuss the Read more about What Is a Belief System Follow-Up Discussion[…]
Today we’re starting a new class called Scripture & Science. As a college student, studying engineering, I remember a particular day at the school library when I had the thought: “Well, I guess I’m going to have to look into scientific objections to the bible.” I had been raised a Christian and believed the bible Read more about 458 Scripture & Science 1: What Is a Belief System? (Will Barlow)[…]
Why is Christianity awesome? Answering this question is a good exercise for us. So often we hear about why Christianity is terrible, especially in the eyes of the world. Many of these critiques are important and we should be humble enough to listen to problems, both real and perceived. However, my goal today is to Read more about 456 Why Christianity Is Awesome (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Today we are addressing Progressive Christianity. To be clear, we are not talking about politics, though they often go hand in hand. Progressive Christianity is an outgrowth of liberal Christianity, which accepted the modernist ethos of the Enlightenment and merged it with Christianity. Likewise Progressive Christianity brings the assumptions and moral commitments of postmodernism to Read more about 448 What’s Wrong with Progressive Christianity? (Mike Winger)[…]
Have you heard of historiography? Your historiography is the method you employ in doing history. This is especially relevant when the scholars who make the rules for doing history decide to exclude any supernatural events from their historiography. Today, my guest, Aaron Shelenberger, continues his rebuttal to Ehrman’s three main objections to the historicity of Read more about 446 Resurrection Objection 3: Supernatural Inaccessible? (Aaron Shelenberger)[…]
Today my guest, Aaron Shelenberger, and I are tackling a second scholarly objection of Bart Ehrman against the resurrection of Jesus. We’re taking a deep dive into the historian’s use of probability to establish whether a particular event happened. Are miracles by definition improbable? Does the rarity of miracles preclude the historian from talking about Read more about 445 Resurrection Objection 2: Improbable Miracles? (Aaron Shelenberger)[…]
Aaron Shelenberger who studied under Mike Licona at Southern Evangelical Seminary in Charlotte, North Carolina, shares about his research on the historicity of the resurrection. In particular, his thesis tackled three main objections brought forth by popular author and anti-Christian Bart Ehrman. Now, I realize this episode and the next two that follow are a Read more about 444 Resurrection Objection 1: Unreliable Gospels? (Aaron Shelenberger)[…]
Did you know that scholars who work on Jesus divide starkly into two major camps? On the one hand, the evangelicals do such great work on the existence of God, the historicity of the resurrection, and the reliability of Scripture. But, then they read the Gospels through the filter of their theological commitments, always coming Read more about 428 Looking for the Historical Jesus between Evangelical and Liberal Scholarship (Sean Finnegan)[…]
This is the last episode of our class, Why Christianity. We’ve covered so many different reasons why Christianity is attractive, makes sense, and is worthy of our attention. We’ve looked at scientific, logical, epistemological, social, psychological, and historical reasons for God’s existence, Christ’s resurrection, and the gospel’s effectiveness. Today, we consider three stories of changed Read more about 403 Why Christianity 16: Changed Lives (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Although many throughout the Western world are quick to criticize Christianity, Jesus remains well-liked. In fact, one of the most obvious answers to the question, “Why Christianity?” is “Jesus.” To this day, reading the Gospels draws the reader to Jesus’ magnetic and compelling way of life. What’s more, the less satisfied we are with our Read more about 402 Why Christianity 15: Jesus the Revolutionary (Daniel Fitzsimmons)[…]
Community is so important. As so many continue to struggle with the ache of loneliness, anxiety about social encounters, and the gnawing pain of depression, we who belong to Christian communities have a huge opportunity and obligation to invite outsiders in, provide them a taste of God’s goodness, and welcome them with a spirit of Read more about 401 Why Christianity 14: Hypocrisy and Community (Daniel Fitzsimmons)[…]
What is the proper role of your emotions? Should you trust them? How do you know when they are helping and when they are hurting? Today we’ll take a look at another exciting advantage that Christianity provides. In this episode, you’ll learn about the problems endemic to emotional reasoning, the robust biblical teaching about your Read more about 400 Why Christianity 13: The Heart (Sean Finnegan)[…]
One of the most enduring problems we have faced throughout human history is tribalism. From the Nazis to the Rwandan genocide, we’ve repeatedly seen the devastating results of group think and dehumanizing outsiders. Although some Christian groups have tragically fallen into this sin, we don’t have to. Christianity provides a better way. We can draw Read more about 399 Why Christianity 12: Inclusiveness (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Who are you and why does your life matter? These two piercing questions get to the heart of your identity. Our society in the West has increasingly embraced an internally discovered identity on the basis of individual passions. Such expressive individualism is exciting to live out, especially if those around you push back, however, the Read more about 398 Why Christianity 11: Christian Identity (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Let’s face it, suffering is a major problem for those of us who believe in a good and powerful God. How do you answer skeptics who challenge your belief in God because of the gratuitous suffering endemic in human history? In this episode we’ll explore some answers to this question offered by several worldviews before Read more about 397 Why Christianity 10: Suffering and Evil (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Freedom and morality are two interrelated concepts that everyone has an opinion about. From a Christian perspective, we limit our freedom based on our received moral code. We believe that the restrictions the bible provides us are for our good; They are not the result of a capricious deity’s arbitrary or stifling whims. In fact, Read more about 396 Why Christianity 9: Christian Freedom and Morality (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 8 of the Why Christianity class. Last time we delved into the first two components of scripture’s overarching story line: creation and fall. These two explain where the world came from and what went wrong with it. Today we’ll consider the last two Read more about 395 Why Christianity 8: Metanarrative 2 (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 7 of the Why Christianity class. So far in this class we have stuck to classic apologetics topics like reasons for God’s existence, the historicity of the resurrection, and the rationality of Christian epistemology. Now we are going to shift gears and do Read more about 394 Why Christianity 7: Metanarrative 1 (Daniel Fitzsimmons)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 6 of the Why Christianity class. The Bible is such a strange thing. On the one hand, it looks like a big book, on the other hand, it’s a library of books. It’s loaded with very different kinds of literature from poetry and Read more about 393 Why Christianity 6: The Origin and Authority of the Bible (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 5 of the Why Christianity class. How would you go about convincing someone that the resurrection of Jesus actually happened? Now, what if that person didn’t recognize the scriptures as inspired by God. How would you go about making a case for Read more about 392 Why Christianity 5: The Resurrection of Jesus Happened (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 4 of the Why Christianity class. Is Christianity irrational? Is believing in God intellectually vacuous? Jerry Wierwille will address the criticism of skeptics that Christian belief is arrogant, unjustified, and irrational. Next, he’ll describe the popular secular belief in scientism before exposing its Read more about 391 Why Christianity 4: Believing in God Is Not Stupid (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 3 of the Why Christianity class. How do you know God is real? What sorts of evidence would you marshal to make a case for God’s existence? It won’t do to tell skeptics you believe in God because you’ve always believed in him, Read more about 390 Why Christianity 3: God Is Real (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 2 of the Why Christianity class. It’s so easy to universalize our own local context. For example, I (Sean) live in a secular, post-Catholic part of New York state. It would be easy for me to think that most of the state or Read more about 389 Why Christianity 2: Lay of the Land (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Listen to this episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts This is part 1 of the Why Christianity class. In a culture where biblical Christianity is falling more and more out of fashion, it’s increasingly important to have confidence in your faith. Today we are beginning a class called Why Christianity, in which we will lay Read more about 388 Why Christianity 1: Introduction (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
This is the second part of a conversation where Jerry Wierwille challenges Brandon Duke’s soul-making theodicy. In particular, Wierwille raises the following questions: Why is hiddenness and epistemic distance considered a necessity for moral development considering the biblical examples where people experienced God and still retained their ability to make real moral choices either to Read more about 365 Challenging Soul-Making Theodicy 2 (Brandon Duke, Jerry Wierwille)[…]
In our last two episodes, Brandon Duke laid out his way of answering the question of why God allows so much suffering in our world. He did so by putting forward a modified version of the late John Hick’s soul-making theodicy. In this episode, Jerry Wierwille pushes back on a few issues with soul-making, preferring Read more about 364 Challenging Soul-Making Theodicy 1 (Brandon Duke, Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Have you ever noticed places in the Old Testament where an updated place name occurs? For example, Genesis 23.2 says “And Sarah died at Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan” and Judges 1.10 says, “And Judah went against the Canaanites who lived in Hebron (now the name of Hebron was formerly Kiriath-arba).” Read more about Updating the Old Testament? (Peter Gentry)[…]
In part one, Brandon Duke laid out some of the important groundwork for thinking about how a good and powerful God might have a world capable of experiencing immense amounts of evil and suffering. In our conversation today, we’ll delve further into the idea of soul-making to explain why suffering like death, damage, decay, and Read more about 363 Why God Allows Suffering 2 (Brandon Duke)[…]
If God is so good and powerful, why is there so much evil in our world? Although you might retort, “It’s because humanity fell into sin and we are all suffering the consequences.” Such an answer merely pushes the question back one step, since God is the one who determined just how fallen our world Read more about 362 Why God Allows Suffering 1 (Brandon Duke)[…]
When Joshua Anderson left home and attended a secular college, the environment bombarded him with skepticism and criticism of Christianity. He internalized the general attitude manifested on campus from professors, students, and text books to such a degree that he began doubting his faith. He fell into a two year period of existential despair as Read more about 361 Paralyzed by Doubt (Joshua Anderson)[…]
This is the sixth and final part of Joshua Anderson’s Announcing the Kingdom evangelism class. In this panel discussion Josh Anderson, Jerry Wierwille, and I discuss several issues before taking questions from the audience. Questions we cover include: How can we develop relationships with non-Christians? How should we handle rejection? What should we say when Read more about 320 Evangelism Panel Discussion (Josh Anderson, Jerry Wierwille, Sean Finnegan)[…]
Have you ever wondered about differences between the Gospels? Thinking Christians have employed a variety of strategies to explain them. In this debate, Mike Licona, author of Why Are There Differences in the Gospels, presents his theory that the differences are merely the result of compositional devices commonly employed by ancient biographers. Richard Howe offers Read more about Mike Licona vs. Richard Howe on Innerancy[…]
Scott Shay is an interesting man. He’s a succesful business man and banker who co-founded a bank in 2001. He even has a TEDx talk where he spoke on Wall Street on the theme, “More Banks, Fewer Problems.” However, he’s also an orthodox Jew who is passionate about his faith. In this interview we talk Read more about 298 Orthodox Jew Defends God, Bible (Scott Shay)[…]
Bill Schlegel lived in Israel for 34 years, much of that time spent studying and then teaching about the geography of the scriptures. In this interview he provides three reasons why every bible-student should study the land of Israel: historical accuracy archeological accuracy geographical accuracy He also talks about his upcoming tour to Israel (March Read more about Interview 53 Why Knowing the Land of Israel Matters (Bill Schlegel)[…]
It’s all too common today to hear someone criticizing God along the lines of, “I could never worship a God who does that.” The critiques of God that are most growing in strength today relate to morality rather than logic, science, or society. One classification of these criticisms relates to God allowing seemingly pointless suffering, Read more about Why You Can’t Judge God[…]
Before delving into specific biblical doctrines, we need to first think about what the bible is. In this lecture you’ll learn what the bible says about itself, some reasons to believe God inspired it, as well as the major types of biblical scholars and how they approach scripture. This episode, along with the last one, Read more about Theology 2 – Bibliology[…]
Q: How do you know the bible is true? A: Because God wrote it. Q: How do you know God wrote it? A: Because the bible says God wrote it. Q: But, how do you know the bible is true? Here we encounter the classic circular argument for the bible’s inspiration. Surely, there’s a better Read more about 155 God’s Book (Sean Finnegan)[…]
When it comes to Genesis 1, Christians tend to divide into two major camps: old earth and young earth creationists. The former sees the days as long periods of time (e.g. Hugh Ross) while the latter insists on literal twenty-four hour periods (e.g. Ken Ham). Professor John Walton of Wheaton College advocates for a different Read more about 152 Why Didn’t God Call the Light Light? (John Walton)[…]
In this concluding teaching of our apologetics conference, John Truitt gleans from Christ’s example key ways that we can imitate him in our own evangelistic efforts today. He begins by looking how Jesus was completely obedient to God and how he prepared himself (both in knowledge and experience). Next Truitt urges us to get moving, Read more about 148 Apologetics Conference: 6 Evangelism, Jesus’ Way (John Truitt)[…]
Have you ever been in a corn maze? The reason they work is because you can only see right in front of you. If you had a live drone feed, you could easily orient yourself and find the way out. This is the benefit of history. We live in a postmodern culture, but it’s hard Read more about 147 Apologetics Conference: 5 Metanarratives and Failed Promises[…]
How should we think through the different major religions of our time? Are they all the same? What are their differences? In this presentation, philosopher of religion, Dale Tuggy, works through key questions that can help us differentiate and distinguish religions from each other. In the second half of his talk, he invites the audience Read more about 146 Apologetics Conference: 4 Are All Religions the Same? (Dale Tuggy)[…]
How do you know the difference between what’s right and wrong? Do morals have an absolute source or does society determine them? In this talk, Kenny Willenburg explains the classic moral argument as well as how we can use this approach to “turn the tables” when people object to Christianity on moral grounds. I’ve also Read more about 145 Apologetics Conference 3: Moral Argument (Kenny Willenburg)[…]
In the second presentation of this Apologetics Conference, we delve into a comparison of three major time periods: (1) the age of authority, (2) the age of reason, and (3) the age of authenticity. We look at how people practiced their faith in each as well as what criticisms apologists answered. For our post-modern time, Read more about 144 Apologetics Conference 2: A Strategy to Reach Our Postmodern World (Sean Finnegan)[…]
Today we are starting something new. I’m very excited to present to you in its entirety, the apologetics conference held in Paducah, KY last June. We’ve got a great line up of speakers for you including Jerry Wierwille, myself, Kenny Willenburg, Dale Tuggy, Kegan Chandler, and John Truitt. It was a wonderful time of meeting Read more about 143 Apologetics Conference 1: The Problem of Privatization (Jerry Wierwille)[…]
Last weekend I participated in an apologetics conference at John and Lisa Truitts’ home in Paducah, Kentucky. It was a wonderful time of meeting people and working together to figure out ways of reaching the millennial generation with the gospel. As it turned out, a great majority of the presentations focused on understanding the post-modern Read more about 2018 Apologetics Conference[…]
Biblical Somatology How the Bible’s View of the Body Cures Social Ills and Unleashes Human Flourishing Sean Finnegan (Restitutio.org) Presented May 6, 2018 27th Theological Conference Sponsored by Restoration Fellowship Introduction Between the apathy and reductionism of those who think our biological bodies don’t matter, and the vanity and superficiality of the celebrity culture that Read more about Biblical Somatology[…]
This is part six in our series on responding to your questions and comments. In light of our killing series, we considered whether Christians should kill the old, the young, enemies, or criminals, however we never addressed the morality of God killing. Brian asked: Can I expect a subsequent episode where you discuss a sort Read more about Off Script 47: Is God’s Violence in the Bible Wrong? (Q&A)[…]
Have you ever heard the martyrdom argument for the resurrection of Jesus? It goes something like this. Jesus’ apostles faced persecution and martyrdom for their confession that God raised Jesus from the dead, sealing their witness with their blood. Why would they die for a lie? Their martyrdom unequivocally proves that they sincerely believed in Read more about 135 The Fate of the Apostles (Sean McDowell)[…]
Mary Willson, director of women’s initiatives for the Gospel Coalition, wrestles with a couple of the Old Testament texts that critics use to show that God hates women, including Deuteronomy 21.10-14 and Numbers 5.11-31. First she looks at how we perceive these ancient scriptures from the perspective of our own culture, then she shows how Read more about 133 Is God a Misogynist? (Mary Willson)[…]
This is part two of our discussion about Charles Mathewes’ Washington Post article, “White Christianity is in big trouble. And it’s its own biggest threat.” Check out part one here. In this episode we consider gun control, immigration, the death penalty, and treatment of the poor in an effort to understand and respond to evangelicalism’s Read more about Off Script 41: Guns, Immigrants, and White Evangelicals[…]
This lecture covers the two main types of criticisms leveled against Christianity during the Enlightenment period: biblical and philosophical. In addition you’ll see how some Christians dug their heals in and worked hard to defend their faith while others gave ground but reinterpreted Christianity in a way that would not only survive the criticisms but Read more about 129 Losing Faith (Five Hundred 13)[…]
While scrolling through Facebook, I came across Charles Mathewes’ Washington Post article, “White Christianity is in big trouble. And it’s its own biggest threat.” At first reading, I was infuriated at what I felt were unfair criticisms, but after I thought about it, I realized what an opportunity this article presented. It collects together no Read more about Off Script 40: Roy Moore, Gay Wedding Cakes, and White Evangelicals[…]
What role does doubt play in your life? Do you think of it as something to push aside and ignore or do you pursue your doubts to get answers? In this episode we examine the role of doubt for Christians, avoiding both extremes of refusing to engage with doubt as well as obsessing on it. Read more about Off Script 29: Dealing with Doubt[…]
The Case for Christ, a classic apologetics book that provides evidence for Jesus’ resurrection, is now a movie! The film follows the lives of Lee and Leslie Strobel, a happily married non-religious couple in the Chicago area. One night out a restaurant, their daughter begins choking on something and nearly dies. However, at the last Read more about Case for Christ Movie Nails It[…]
Let’s say you are sharing your faith with a friend and they say to you, “Well, I’m glad that Christianity works for you, but it sounds like no fun to me.” How would you respond? Is Christianity no more than a set of restrictions we set on our lives like a straitjacket? Listen in to Read more about Off Script 22: Christianity Is Lame[…]
The youngest part of the bible is nearly 2,000 years old. How can such an ancient book have any relevance to our complex and technologically advanced world? How would you answer this objection? It’s certainly undeniable that our world is so much different from the nomadic shepherds of three millennia ago. However, science, political innovations, Read more about Off Script 21: The Bible Is Too Antiquated[…]
Apologetics 15: Gender and Sexual Ethics (Objection 3) This lecture covers some basic Christian sexual ethics, including marriage, divorce, pornography, homosexuality, cohabitation, and adultery. Sadly, since this was the last lecture, time did not permit a thorough analysis of these subjects. Even so, I touched on each briefly and biblically in an effort to stake Read more about Podcast 65: Christian Views of Sexuality (Apologetics 15)[…]
Apologetics 14: Science (Objection 2) Although our culture commonly pits science and faith against each other, as if they’ve been at war for centuries, the truth is that faith gave birth to science. In this lecture, you’ll learn about some of the main science objections that skeptics bring against Christianity and how to respond to Read more about Podcast 64: Science vs. the Bible (Apologetics 14)[…]
In this episode, we pick up the conversation where the last lecture in my Apologetics class left off. We review six reasons the bible gives for suffering as well as how to face pain and hardship. By looking at Jesus and Paul, we see that God did not spare either of them from adversity. Jesus Read more about Off Script 19: More on Why God Allows Suffering[…]
Apologetics 13: Problem of Evil (Objection 1) Now that we’ve established the existence of God, the historicity of Christ’s resurrection, and the bible’s veracity, we come to objections commonly brought against Christianity. The chief classical question posed to Christians throughout the eons is, “How can you believe in God when there is so much pain Read more about Podcast 63: Why Does God Allow Suffering? (Apologetics 13)[…]
In part two of our series on objections to Christianity, we look at the issue of hypocrisy. Many are unwilling to even consider Christianity as a viable option because they’ve witnessed or heard about some horrible act of hypocrisy by a Christian leader. It’s hard to deny that hypocrisy is a major problem in Christianity Read more about Off Script 18: Christians Are Hypocrites[…]
Apologetics 12: New Testament Trustworthiness For the New Testament we can employ several of the same lines of reasoning as the Old Testament, though there are a couple more to consider like internal evidence and messianic prophecies that help bolster the case. Furthermore, many people’s lives have been changed by reading and believing the words Read more about Podcast 62: Is the New Testament Trustworthy? (Apologetics 12)[…]
With this episode we are beginning a series on overcoming objections to Christianity. To start with we want to address the criticism often leveled at bible-believing Christians today that our perspective on salvation is too narrow-minded and exclusive. Who are we to say that all the other religions are wrong? In order to tackle this Read more about Off Script 17: Is Jesus the Only Way to God?[…]
Apologetics 11: New Testament Transmission With the New Testament we can’t argue for a reliable transmission on the basis of meticulous Hebrew scribes. More often, especially early on, the Christian scribes focused more on quantity than quality so they could get the word out as quickly as possible. However, the sheer number of manuscripts that Read more about Podcast 61: Is the New Testament Reliable? (Apologetics 11)[…]
Apologetics 10: Old Testament Trustworthiness Last time we looked as reasons to believe the Jewish scribes reliably transmitted the Old Testament so that what we have today is what they actually wrote. This time you’ll learn five main reasons why we believe the Hebrew bible is true: (1) archaeology, (2) medical insights, (3) unflattering honesty, Read more about Podcast 59: Is the Old Testament Trustworthy? (Apologetics 10)[…]
Apologetics 9: Old Testament Transmission What reasons do we have for believing the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible) was reliable transmitted from antiquity to today? This lecture provides four arguments: (1) Jewish scribes were competent, (2) people memorized large portions of the text, (3) the consequences for false prophecy, and (4) the Dead Sea Scrolls function Read more about Podcast 58: Is the Old Testament Reliable? (Apologetics 9)[…]
Apologetics 8: More Evidence for the Resurrection Because secular historians don’t accept the inspiration of the bible, they don’t trust the Gospels as reliable witnesses about Jesus. Consequently, they’ve come up with various “criteria of authenticity” to sift the sayings and deeds recorded in the Gospels into historical and mythical categories. Last time we saw Read more about Podcast 57: More Evidence for the Resurrection (Apologetics 8)[…]
Apologetics 7: Evidence for the Resurrection During this lecture, I played a video of William Lane Craig making a case for the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. What’s so brilliant about Craig’s approach is that he doesn’t assume the bible is true to make his case. He treats the Gospels and Paul’s letters Read more about Podcast 56: Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus (Apologetics 7)[…]
Check out this video from William Craig’s ministry, Reasonable Faith, explaining why God exists using the ontological argument. Here is the argument: God is the greatest conceivable being God exists as an idea in the mind A being that exists as an idea in the mind and in reality is greater than a being that Read more about The Ontological Argument for God’s Existence[…]
Apologetics 6: Historical Jesus Have you ever heard of the Jesus mythicists? They teach that Jesus never existed, that he’s a myth. How would you go about debunking this claim? Are you aware of what historical sources mention Jesus and early Christianity? In this lecture you’ll learn what’s out there from biblical authors, historians, and Read more about Podcast 55: Did Jesus Exist? (Apologetics 6)[…]
Check out this video from William Craig’s ministry, Reasonable Faith, explaining why God exists using the fine tuning of physical constants. Here is the three step argument: The universe evidences order and design A design implies a designer A designer of the universe exists This argument works for any living creatures (hummingbirds, bacteria, etc.), complex Read more about Fine Tuning Argument for God[…]
Check out this video from William Craig’s ministry, Reasonable Faith, explaining why God exists using morality. Here is the three step argument: If God doesn’t exist, objective morals don’t exist Objective morals do exist God exists If we agree that certain actions are morally wrong for everyone (objective morality), then we have to look for Read more about The Moral Argument for God’s Existence[…]
Check out this video from William Craig’s ministry, Reasonable Faith, explaining why God exists using cause and effect. Here is the three step argument: Whatever begins to exist has a cause The universe began to exist Therefore, the universe has a cause Just like dominoes falling in a row, we cannot explain the present day Read more about The Kalam Cosmological Argument[…]
Apologetics 5: Arguments for God (Part Two) In this lecture, you’ll learn four more reasons for God’s existence, including the cosmological argument, moral argument, miracles argument, and the ontological argument. These are each quite different from each other, which is great because it increases their cumulative effect. Last of all, you’ll learn about “Pascal’s Wager,” Read more about Podcast 54: Four More Reasons Why God Exists (Apologetics 5)[…]
Apologetics 4: Teleological Arguments for God’s Existence If someone asked you, “Why do you believe in God?” How would you answer? Sadly, most of us would flounder around, maybe talking about the bible or second-hand miracles. However, philosophers have long identified three classic approaches to reasoning about God’s existence: the ontological, cosmological, and teleological arguments. Read more about Podcast 53: Does God Exist? (Apologetics 4)[…]
Unbelievers often criticize Christianity because of how it takes away personal freedoms. If I agree to follow Jesus, then I can no longer do as I please; I’m no longer free. Christians limit sex to marriage. They don’t party. Their book won’t let them express themselves without worrying about “corrupt communication.” I’m sure you’ve come Read more about Does Christianity Limit Personal Freedom?[…]
Apologetics 3: Theism, Atheism, and Pantheism In Building Belief, Chad Meister uses a worldview comparison chart to simplify all the religions of the world into three broad categories: theism, atheism, and pantheism. This strategy will help you to compare and contrast five major aspects of these three worldviews, including theology, ontology, epistemology, axiology, and anthropology. Read more about Podcast 52: Theism, Atheism, and Pantheism (Apologetics 3)[…]
Apologetics 2: What Is Truth? In order to establish any of the claims of Christianity, we must first make a case for truth itself. How can you hope to provide reasons for God’s existence or Christ’s resurrection if the person your talking to claims, “That’s just your truth, and I’m glad it works for you, Read more about Podcast 51: Pluralism, Post-Modernism, Relativism, and Truth (Apologetics 2)[…]
Apologetics 1: Introduction Have you ever heard of apologetics? This is the field where Christians seek to provide the reasons for why they believe what they believe. In a post-Christian society, it is increasingly important to understand the reasons for your faith. For example, why do you believe in God’s existence? Why do you think Read more about Podcast 50: Why Defend Your Faith? (Apologetics 1)[…]
Have you ever heard someone say, “I don’t see how you can trust the bible. It started out in Hebrew then it was translated into Greek and then Latin before coming into old English and, last of all, modern English?” This is such a unfounded criticism though it sounds pretty convincing. Here are the facts. Read more about Bible Translation Like Telephone Game?[…]
Archaeologists have recently identified a bulla that belonged to Hezekiah, the ancient king of Judah. In addition to Sennacherib’s prism and the Siloam tunnel, this new find bolsters our confidence in the historicity of the biblical Hezekiah. Here is a short definition of what bullae are from the Biblical Archeaeology Society: Clay bullae, or seal Read more about Hezekiah Bulla[…]