Category Archives: Bible

Biblical Teaching

Creation and Inerrancy: Evaluating the Mortenson vs Ross Debate

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Wolf in Sheep's clothing in lab coat with bible surrounded by sheep.

“Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. (Mat 7:15)

There was a recent[1] debate on creation and inerrancy which addressed the question: “Does belief in inerrancy necessitate a particular view of the age of the earth?”[2] In contrast to U.S. political debates this election cycle where moderators prop up one candidate and challenge the other one, this debate was moderated fairly by apologist Frank Turek who holds to the old earth position[3], though you couldn’t detect it from the way he moderated. Debater Terry Mortenson holds to the young earth position, as do I, and the other debater, Hugh Ross, holds to the old earth position. 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

Left Behind: The Biggest Sign after the Eclipse

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Total Solar Eclipse, April 8th, 2024, NASA

Total Eclipse April 8th, 2024, NASA

In 2017 we traveled down near St. Louis to be in the path of totality for the eclipse that year. It was such a wondrous, awe-inspiring event that, when my wife asked if we were going to do it again this year, I thought, “How many more chances are we going to get?” (It turns out that the next one viewable in the States is in twenty years). So, with no further debate needed, I said, “Yes, we’re going.” No matter that hotels were doubling and tripling their fees for the occasion, traffic was predicted to be horrendous and Indiana, our destination for viewing, declared a state of emergency to make sure they had enough emergency services available.

The free solar glasses the hotel gave upon arrival, knowing why most people were there, didn’t make up for the highly overpriced room, but the event itself more than compensated for it. At the moment of totality I was once again filled with awe, wonder and amazement. The moon, appearing to be the exact same size as the sun, smoothly slid in front of the disc of the sun and perfectly covered it. This allowed the sun’s corona to be viewed with the naked eye, eclipse glasses off, with the sun no longer a blindingly bright light but a dark circle. I’m no photographer, and my phone and camera are a few years old, but here is the modest picture I took: Continue Reading

Risen – A Reflection on the True Messiah

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A Resurrection Day Meditation
Risen -2016

From considering false messiahs, a type of the Antichrist in the previous article, to this article which, for this resurrection day (a holiday commonly called Easter), we move on to considering the true Messiah.  On Easter day Christians commonly  say to each other:

Jesus Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed!

So we will consider the true messiah in the context of the 2016 movie Risen, a movie that explores the question: what would you do if you had personally seen both the death of Yeshua [1] and then, a number of days later, saw him alive and well and spoke with him, whose touch you felt and in whose presence you ate  and asked him questions. Would that finally move you to faith? Though that question is aimed at skeptics, doubters and unbelievers, the movie also provides encouragement for believers which we’ll get to.

Without going into all the tenets of the Christian faith, like the gospels, this movie gives you ample evidence to believe this section of the Nicene Creed, which is at the heart of the Christian faith and what we’re considering today:

For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried. On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures;

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Q11 – Why are Christians so stuck on believing their Bibles instead of science?

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Science Research

We now consider the question, “Why are Christians so stuck on believing their Bibles instead of science.” This is a false dichotomy because Christians do not reject all science. The question either reveals a profound ignorance of the nature of science and the scientific process or implicitly denies that science, by its very nature, is constantly rejecting things as false that were previously thought to be true. Tenets, previously accepted as good science one day, can be rejected as foolish and obsolete the next.

Regarding the nature of God, the question reveals either ignorance concerning God or a denial of the nature of God and the Bible. God is omniscient. He has perfect knowledge (John 21.17, Heb 4.13). He never learns anything because he already knows everything. The Bible is the word of God, breathed out from the omniscient God (2 Tim 3.16) and all it affirms is true (Ps 119.160). Therefore, as expected of knowledge coming from God who is perfect in knowledge, the Bible is wholly true and without error in all it affirms. This is known as the doctrine of inerrancy. Continue Reading

Q2 Why are Christians opposed to equality in marriage?

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marriage - definitioin

This question, “Why are Christians opposed to equality in marriage?” again shows the poisoned well thinking common in this culture and age. I’m tempted to give a quick, accurate answer to this, but it is such a loaded question, a quick answer will not address the errors implicit in this challenge which is fraught with many antibiblical assumptions. So, as Fräulein Maria tells the von Trapp children when they need to learn the basics, “Let’s start at the very beginning.” Let’s get the assumptions out in the open. We’ll start with definitions.

What is meant by “equality”?
What is meant by “marriage”?

On Equality

Christians believe that everyone has the right to marry any eligible person of the opposite sex of marriageable age who will willingly marry the person in question. That is “equality” for all, but already I hear objections because clearly this definition imposes limitations. But having limitations does not mean there are “inequalities” because everyone is under the same limitations. It would only be “unequal” if some people were under restrictions and others were not, but that is not the case. Everyone is under the same restrictions. (Except for one case I’ll discuss below.) So let’s look at the restrictions. Continue Reading

Israel at War – The Hidden Reason

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We stand with Israel now and Forever - Doubling Down - We stand with Israel (now and forever)

On October 7th, 2023, the Jews in Israel suffered the most deadly, wicked, evil attack on Jewish people since the Holocaust. Perversely proud to be responsible for the massacre: the terrorist group Hamas who killed Jewish families in their homes, burning some of them alive, raped women, beheaded babies, and kidnapped people of all ages – from babies to grandmothers – to hold as hostages. As of this writing the count of the number of dead stands at 1,500 and the number of hostages is over two hundred.

Hamas supporters all over the world celebrated and continue to celebrate the evil event, and call for more, shouting “From the river to the sea Palestine will be free.” By which they mean from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean sea, Israel’s homeland will be free of both the state of Israel and the Jewish people. In other words, they want to wipe both Jews and the Jewish state off the face of the earth. Continue Reading

Opting Out of Pride Month

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Fidelity - Opting Out of gay Pride Month

Whenever I hear talk of gay “pride” or “Pride Month”, I can’t help but think of the Bible verse about those who take pride in what they should be ashamed of, a verse that also talks about their destiny. (Php 3.18-19) Here it is amplified from the Today’s English Version (TEV). I say “amplified” because the TEV is not a straight translation. In attempting to put the scriptures in modern English, they liberally paraphrase. So here it is from the TEV:

I have told you this many times before, and now I repeat it with tears: there are many whose lives make them enemies of Christ’s death on the cross. They are going to end up in hell, because their god is their bodily desires. They are proud of what they should be ashamed of, and they think only of things that belong to this world.
Philippians 3.18-19 TEV

As it did in the apostle’s day, this describes people living in sin and that is no more true today than it is for the many people promoting “pride” today. Knowing the destiny of such people, the apostle Paul was grieved to tears as we all should be. But aside from our grief, what is an appropriate Christian response to the inundation of events and propaganda concerning “Pride” month? A proper response begins with a proper understanding and assessment of what “Pride” month is and what it stands for. Continue Reading

Were The Pyramids Built Before the Flood? Correcting The Record

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Correcting the Record - Were teh Pyramids built Before the Flood

From the title of the video, “Were the Pyramids Built Before the Flood”[1] by Nathan Hoffman, you might suppose this video was going to focus on the dating issues around which came first, the pyramids or the global flood? If you thought so, you, like me, would be wrong. Next, you might think it was on issues concerning biblical dating, with his suggestion that the earth is older than the 6,000 years that biblical creationists claim it is. If so, you, like me, would be mostly wrong again. While his issue concerns dating, that is not really the focus nor his main issue. As Dr. Watson is a foil to show how smart and clever Sherlock Holmes is, these issues are merely foils to lead into his main issue. The main issue that Hoffman has – which he focuses on in both this pyramid video and his previous video “How Long Were the Israelites in Egypt”[2] – is with the text from which today’s Bibles translate the Old Testament. The Old Testament in today’s Bibles is translated from what is considered the most reliable text by bible scholars, the Masoretic Text (MT). But Hoffman has an issue with it, an issue bordering on an unhealthy antipathy, it appears. Think I exaggerate? Hoffman says of the MT: “All of our Bibles were copied from this corrupted version of the Hebrew.”(29:08)  Corrupted? It is known there are scribal errors in all versions of hand copied ancient scriptures. But scholars, who respect the text, typically don’t call the texts “corrupted” and, in fact, work to identify such errors to get back to what the original text – which we no longer have – said.

Pyramids or Flood First?

I wrote this critique of his video not because of the question in the title. In viewing, it  quickly becomes clear the age of the pyramids is not the main concern for Hoffman because he starts the video by refuting the theory that the pyramids were built before the flood in the first minute of the video when he points out: Continue Reading

Is the Bible the Word of God?

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An agnostic sent a question about the word of God to Creation Ministries International. CMI retweeted it here, the full question is here and is answered by CMI rep Jonathan Sarfati. Sarfati approaches it on the basis of valid, internally consistent philosophical systems. But I want to take it in a different direction and answer it evidentially. That is, is there evidence that the Bible is the word of God? So in this article we’ll to take a look at the heart of the question and address the key issue which, as the agnostic puts it, is this:

I’m not denying that the bible is an excellent book, nor that it may be the word of God, but I will question one tenet:

That the Bible must be the word of God, because it says so.

Now, consider me heretic, but it strikes me that this is a ridiculous line of thought to take? If I were to say that my face was made of cucumber, and I’m four hundred years old, would that make it so simply because I said so?
I’m not entirely convinced that it would.

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