Category Archives: 100 Questions

Article series that address questions / challenges Identified by Tom Gilson in the article “Are We Ready? More Than a Hundred Challenges Christians Have Never Faced Before” The questions (and answers as soon as they’re written)  are here: 100 Questions – Rational Faith

Q.34 People with real courage will face up to the cold hard realities of a godless universe.

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Does consciousness arise out of a lifeless, mindless explosion of nothing?

Does consciousness arise out of a lifeless, mindless explosion of nothing?

It seems this questioner has been imbibing too deeply into the flawed philosophy of atheists such as Richard Dawkins. Dawkins, in his 2006 book “The God Delusion”, is often quoted as saying:

“The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”

This is clearly Dawkins’ way of restating his view that there is no God, because God’s universe is quite different from Dawkins’. God’s universe is of course created by God with superintelligent design, purpose, meaning, and no evil when created. God created it so he could show love to man, the pinnacle of his creation (Ps 8.5), and man could show love back to God. So Dawkins’ assertion about the meaninglessness and purposelessness of the universe can be falsified by demonstrating that his root assertion—that there is no God—is false. Continue Reading

Q41 Didn’t Constantine tell the bishops what to put in the Bible?

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Constantine's Vision - By this sign, you will conquer

Constantine’s Vision – “By this sign, you will conquer”

This question deals with the canon and history. Before we can answer the question concerning Constantine “the Great”, we must understand what the canon is and get a little background on what was happening in the time of Emperor Constantine. Let’s start with the canon.

The Canon of Scripture

As it is used today, the canon is the list of 66 books which are included in the Bible. Here is how the word “canon” and its usage came about:

“Etymologically, kanōn is a Semitic loan word that originally had the meaning “reed.” From this came the figurative sense of a “measuring rod” or “ruler” and from this the general idea of a “norm” or “standard.” Finally, the term could adopt the purely formal sense of a “list” or a “table.” [1]

The 66 books of the Bible—39 Old Testament books and 27 New Testament books—were not wantonly placed in the Bible by kings or bishops. Books were included in the canon because they were recognized to be from God using a process that contained a number of criteria.  As the McDowells put it: Continue Reading

Q18 Hasn’t Science Proved Miracles aren’t Real?

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Five men roll a massive stone to seal Jesus' Tomb - AD - The Bible Continues

Five men roll a massive stone to seal Jesus’ Tomb – AD – The Bible Continues

This question is from someone who clearly does not understand the limits of science or the scientific method. So let me start with a comparison to demonstrate why science can neither prove nor disprove miracles. Asking if science has proved miracles are not real is like asking if your bathroom scale has showed how much your pet [cat, dog, whatever – insert here] loves you. It should be readily apparent why your bathroom scale, which measures physical weight, cannot measure a non-physical quantity like love, particularly in a creature that is not even human. So there is no way for it to determine if your pet is even capable of “love.” Careful – behavior is not love. Even if your pet exhibits certain behaviors, that is not proof of love, and, even if it were, it (love) is still not a quantity that your scale could measure. Continue Reading

Q33 Why does God hide? Where’s the evidence?

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Father walks bride down the aisle

Every time a father walks a bride down the aisle they provide evidence of God by recreating the first wedding when God walked Eve to Adam

I shortened the follow up question for the sake of making it fit in a title. The full question is:

Why does God hide? If God wants us to believe, why doesn’t he give us more evidence?


Is God Hiding?

First off, regarding God supposedly concealing himself: God is not hiding. When you read your Bible, the following facts are made clear.

1. In this age of the gospel, God is not hiding. He is spirit (John 4.24) and therefore invisible (Col 1.15, 1 Tim 1.17) to our physical eyes.

2. It is a good thing that God has separated himself from us so that we cannot see him, because sinful man cannot come into the presence of the holy God and live. Before man sinned he could see God and be in his presence. We learn this from the first marriage. After God created Adam the first man, God saw that it was not good for the man to be alone. (Gen 2.18) So God created a “suitable helper” for the man and brought her (Eve) to the man. (Gen 2.22) By the way, this bringing of Eve to Adam by God is why, during a wedding, fathers walk their daughters down the aisle to present their daughter to the groom. It is a reenactment of the first marriage. Continue Reading

Q27 Christianity is anti-intellectual. I’d be embarrassed to say I believed any of it.

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The Thinker by Auguste Rodin

“The Thinker” by Auguste Rodin

Before showing the foolishness of being embarrassed when said embarrassment is caused by ignorance of Christian belief, we must deal with the lead and clearly false statement “Christianity is anti-intellectual” which shouts a demand for a definition of “anti-intellectual.” So let’s start there.

From Merriam Webster online:

anti-Intellectual: (adjective) “opposing or hostile to intellectuals or to an intellectual view or approach” [1]

So what’s “Intellectual”? Again from Merriam Webster online:

Intellectual (adjective)
a : of or relating to the intellect or its use
b : developed or chiefly guided by the intellect rather than by emotion or experience : RATIONAL
c: requiring use of the intellect

2 a: given to study, reflection, and speculation
b: engaged in activity requiring the creative use of the intellect [2]

Christianity meets all the definitions of being intellectual, therefore based on the logical principal of non-contradiction, since Christianity is intellectual, it cannot be anti-intellectual. To be precise, Christianity meets all the above uses of the word “intellectual.” For intellectuals who may question it, following is a brief illustration that Christianity in fact meets all aspects of being intellectual.

Continue Reading

Q4: If Christ came for all, why do Christians exclude LGBTQ+ People?

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The Rainbow - sign of a promise of God, not a symbol of pride

As the gay pride flag misappropriates the rainbow, the sign of the covenant God made (Gen 9.12-17),  this question misappropriate the message of the gospel. So let’s clear it up. The question is:
Question 4 – Christ says he came for all, so why do Christians want to exclude LGBTQ+ people?
There are indeed a number of biblical texts that indicate God’s desire to save all people. You find them in both the Old and New Testaments:

Salvation is offered to all

Old Testament:

For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign LORD. Repent and live!
(Ezek 18:32)

Continue Reading

Q14 – Age of the Earth – The Bible vs Science – Is the Bible wrong?

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Blue Stars - NASA

Blue Stars – Image – NASA

Q14 – The Bible says the universe is just a few thousand years old, but science says it’s actually billions of years. The Bible is wrong!

Let’s start by understanding the entities we’re discussing. The Bible is the written word of an almighty, omniscient, omnipresent God who brought into existence every created thing—in the heavens and on earth. The Bible is the word of this God who knows everything. This brings us to an interesting question. Do you know everything? If you don’t know everything, how do you know what you think you know is correct? How do you know whether or not that you, in your lack of knowledge, are missing a key piece that could change everything you think you know now? How do you know your knowledge, which is incomplete, is not unlike the picture you get of suspects during a mystery movie? You look at all the evidence you’re given and all of the suspects. For an hour and forty-five minutes of a two-hour movie it’s clear that the butler did it. Then, at an hour and forty-six minutes, a new clue is revealed. All of a sudden it’s clear that the butler didn’t do it. It’s the [insert your new obvious suspect here]. Maybe your new suspect is guilty, maybe not. You’re still not sure until they do all the revelations and resolutions in the last five to ten minutes of the movie. Continue Reading

Q17: You say everything needs a creator, so who created God?

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God is eternal

The question “Who created God?”, is at the heart of the matter for Question 17:  “You say everything needs a creator, so who created God?” and it shows a severe misunderstanding of both the nature of God and the cosmological argument for the existence of God—specifically the Kalam cosmological argument [1]. Let’s start with the Kalam cosmological argument, which makes it easy to see where the error crept in.

Apologist William Lane Craig has used this argument as one of the premiere arguments for the proof of the existence of God, so it’s in many of his books. As he points out in “On Guard”, it’s simple, easy to memorize, easy to share and logically “airtight.” It goes like this:  Continue Reading

Q10: Why do Christians want to control women’s bodies?

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Year AD 2000 – Picture of the Century

This question “Why do Christians want to control women’s bodies” shows how willing people are to deceive themselves when they don’t want to accept the truth and instead would prefer to believe a lie. (cf 2 Thess 2.12). Before I get to this question concerning a woman’s body, let me ask three questions that will help put things in context:

1. Is murder contingent on a person’s location? For example, if you murder someone outside their house, is it still murder if you unjustifiably with “malice aforethought” (Num 35.20-21) kill them inside their house? Continue Reading

Q15: Psychology, evolution, agency and creation

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Robin Hood splits the arrow

Robin Hood splits the arrow

This question is too long to be an article title. The title I used just captures the elements involved. Here is the full question:

Question 15: Psychology says evolution has wired people to find “agency” — a personal cause — in everything, even when we know it’s not true. If they think the world and what happens here has a personal cause, it’s just another case of imagining agency when it isn’t really there.

This is a complex question filled with assumptions and bad reasoning. So let’s start by identifying the assumptions and bad reasoning, and then we’ll go on to the core of the question and the answer. Continue Reading