Thinking about God, Jesus and The Big Questions

I am now on my second time around reading the Bible from beginning to end.  I was wondering if I would discover new things that I didn't notice the first time.  This was indeed the case! This time around, the first thing I noticed was that Adam and Eve appeared to be in different states before and after the fall, and I spent some time thinking about this. Before the fall, Adam and Eve were in a more innocent state than we know today: Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. Genesis 2:25 However, Adam and Eve were capable of understanding directions and of choosing to obey or disobey.  In fact, the serpent was able to tempt Eve into eating the fruit of the tree.  Eve knew that this was against God's command: The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.'" Genesis 3: 2...

A major sticking point for Christians is doubt.  Many Christians ask themselves "How do I know I have truly accepted the salvation offered through Jesus?"  Note: Some people even doubt whether the offer of salvation extends to them (it does; through Jesus' sacrifice, God offers salvation freely to everyone, just as they are - a separate post covers that issue ).  This post deals with the self-doubt of whether someone has truly accepted salvation through Jesus.  Usually, this doubt stems from one of two things: 1. An expectation of what their life should be like after having Jesus in their life, which doesn't match up with what they are currently experiencing, and/or 2.  an expectation that they should have a special feeling or experience at the moment that they believed in Jesus. These expectations are just that - expectations, and you should not doubt whether you have accepted Jesus as your redeemer, just because your l...

Just as atheists cannot prove that God doesn't exist, neither can Christians prove that He does.  However, many atheists are under the mistaken impression that it is the 'job' of Christians to prove God's existence (even though they make no attempt to prove their opposing stance!) No, is not up to believers to prove the existence of God, and this is why.  Jesus and God want us to come to believe in them of our own free will, and to come to them via faith (as opposed to deductive reasoning).  If there was absolute, total proof of God's existence, there would be no reason to have faith.  It would then be a no-brainer that God exists, and we would have come to him via a mere act of observation instead of by faith.   Why is faith important? Because it triggers our spiritual development. The spirit is not something which is wishy-washy - it is there, but hard to detect. Make no mistake: whether someone is Christian or atheist, either way i...

When it comes to religious matters, we Christians believe our very souls are at stake.  Atheists do not believe there is anything so serious at stake.  Anyone would therefore expect that Christians would shout their message the loudest, since they believe there is the most at stake.  However, it seems that both 'shout' similarly loudly.  Why is that?    Both camps genuinely believe that their version is the underlying truth (although of course, both cannot be right).  Therefore, both camps have the truth at stake; they think of themselves as campaigners for the truth.  In addition, Christians believe our souls are at stake.  Why then do atheists shout so loud when they believe there is less at stake?   This is a question which is difficult to answer.  However, we should be aware that Christianity can actually benefit from these loud shoutings of the atheists.  Why is that? It is because the atheists give us spec...

This is the long-promised post on the issue of those who reject the Bible because it isn't "complete" (by their standards).  The Bible isn't meant to be a science textbook The Bible is sufficient to generate faith.  The Bible is not meant to contain all the answers to scientific questions, nor is it meant to be a manual on how the universe works.  It is a guide to God and Jesus.  Just as a music textbook needn't include for instance a section on English literature, neither does a book on God and Jesus have to include sections on music, engineering, science, etc.  However, it is surprising how many atheists expect that the Bible should do all these things!  What would happen if the Bible DID contain 'everything'? Let's consider for a moment what would happen if the bible was very "complete" (by atheist standards).  This would result in a huge and lengthy tome which no-one would ever read! Even with the life expectancy of today, even a B...

We live in a post-Fall existence.  We therefore cannot truly imagine what the Garden of Eden must have looked like before the Fall.  However, it must have been a beautiful, comfortable, and low-maintenance place to live.  There were no weeds or thistles, no poisonous plants.  Tending to the plants and obtaining nutrition from these plants was a straightforward business. Adam and Eve had never seen a weed or an unwanted, undesirable plant in their lives. All the plants there were beautiful and/or useful: The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground - trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Genesis 2: 9 Unlike Adam and Eve at that point, we on the other hand, are all too familiar with  weeds.  They spring up much faster than the plants we are trying to cultivate, and will choke their growth and spread their seed quickly. ...

I have read the book "The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins.   ["The Blind Watchmaker - why the evidence of evolution reveals a universe without design" by Richard Dawkins (1986) W.W. Norton & Company, New York.] Although the book is intended to argue for atheism, it falls far short of this mark.   Instead it could be more accurately described as arguing for evolution and against creationism.   However, most Christians and most types of Christian theology do not have any problem with evolution - indeed, many Christians see evolution as a necessary part of God's design.   Just as I cannot prove the existence of God, neither can Dawkins disprove it In "The Blind Watchmaker" Richard Dawkins uses examples of the complexity of life to argue against a designer, instead arguing that these complexities came about through evolution.   Indeed it reads more as a carefully thought out popular-science book on evolution, than as an argument promoti...