Faith Archives – Rational Faith

Risen – A Reflection on the True Messiah

Posted on March 30, 2024 by Duane Caldwell — Leave a reply

A Resurrection Day Meditation

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;

Q25 Faith is believing without evidence, Right?

Posted on March 7, 2024 by Duane Caldwell — Leave a reply

Thomas sees the risen Jesus. That evidence causes him to believe.
– The Bible Episode 10 “Courage”

“Faith is believing without evidence, right?” Wrong! Emphatically wrong. Those who want you to believe faith is believing without evidence are either ignorant (but well meaning) Christians, or more likely – those like atheists and Satan and those deceived by them–all who will be spending eternity in hell. Such want you to be just as foolish as they are by condemning yourself along with them by believing this foolish platitude. Don’t fall for it. Faith is not “believing without evidence.” On the contrary, Christians believe because of the evidence. Continue Reading

Who Can See the Resurrection? (A meditation)

Posted on April 3, 2021 by Duane Caldwell

The risen Messiah is revealed to Mary Magdalene

Jesus reveals himself to Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb. “The Bible”, Ep 10 “Courage”

A resurrection day meditation

In the palm Sunday service this past Sunday, the pastor at my church mentioned that “the great crowd” (John 12.12) that had come out to see Jesus was huge. He mentioned it was likely multiple tens of thousand of people, something I hadn’t considered before. That’s a staggering number. So like a good Berean (Acts 17.11), I got out my Bible history to check.

Sure enough, in “Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus” in an excursus on the number of visitors to Jerusalem during the Passover, Bible historian Jeremias summarizes: Continue Reading

Knowledge of the Holy One Part 3: God the Father

Posted on June 12, 2020 by Duane Caldwell

The Father runs to the returning prodigal

Since Jesus, the son of God, is the key to salvation, we started with him and spent the first two articles in this series looking at who he is, and just as importantly, who he isn’t. The picture we have of Jesus is very clear: starting with the creed of the Christian faith:

Jesus Christ is Lord; (Php 2.11)

Indeed he is both Lord and Christ (or Messiah) (Acts 2.36)
This is the central creed of Christianity.

But we have further statements that help clarify who Jesus is:
Jesus is the one who:

… has all authority in heaven and earth (Matt 28.18)
… is the one who died and came to life again and lives forever (Rev 1.18)
… is the holder of the keys of life (John 11.25-26) and death (Rev 1.18)
… is the Ruler of God’s Creation (Rev 3.14)
… is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Rev 19.16)
… is the one to whom every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord (Php 2.11).

There is an implicit understanding in each of these statements. Namely that there is one who has bestowed these rights and titles on Jesus.

Who has given Jesus all authority in heaven and earth?
Whose power and glory raised him from the dead?
Who has given him the keys to life and death?
Who has made him ruler of God’s creation?
Who has made him King of Kings and Lord of Lords?

It is the one who is glorified on the day when every knee will bow to Jesus and every tongue confesses “Jesus Christ is Lord.” The person[1] so glorified is God the father. (Php 2.11) Continue Reading

3 Responses to the Deadly Atheist Meme Even Christians Get Wrong

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Duane Caldwell

As a corollary to their false belief that there is no evidence for God, many atheists are fond of using a wide spread but incorrect meme that express the idea that Faith is belief without evidence. In an article on The Stream titled “The Deadly Atheist Meme Even Christians Get Wrong” Tom Gilson addresses it as put forth by atheist cheerleader Richard Dawkins:

Faith is belief without evidence and reason;
Coincidentally that’s also the definition of delusion[1]

Tom’s approach: he uses the logical argument known as reductio ad absurdum to illustrate one reason why the statement is wrong. This type of argument demonstrates that the statement is false by supposing it to be true then illustrating that the logical and inevitable result or conclusion of the argument is patently absurd or false. Continue Reading

Testimony of the Shepherds – an Enduring Sign

Posted on December 25, 2018 by Duane Caldwell

The Shepherds and the Angel

A Christmas Day Meditation

This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.”

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.

When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.
(Luke 2.12-18)

I often get the impression that many unbelievers think that if they themselves personally had a sign from God they would believe. Which leads them to wonder why God doesn’t give more signs.

This whole line of questioning of God’s use of signs makes me wonder – if you think God needs to provide you with a sign, if he did, would you believe him? As I’ve demonstrated previously, unless you’re already inclined to believe, the likely answer is no. Signs are a type of evidence. And unless you’re willing to believe what the evidence is pointing to, no amount of evidence will persuade you. Even so it appears to me God has left evidence more powerful than a sign. But before we can understand it, let’s look first at how God uses signs: Continue Reading

Evidence is for Believers – Not Mockers

Posted on November 30, 2018 by Duane Caldwell

“Let the children come” – Jesus

If you’re reading this, you likely have an interest in either finding evidence for the Christian faith, or presenting evidence to defend your faith. The endeavor to defend the faith is known as apologetics. When doing apologetics we often have a focus on presenting evidence or reasons to believe in the Christian faith. That is why you see apologetics ministries with names like Reasonable Faith[1] or Reasons to Believe[2] and even my own Rational Faith. In this age dominated by Science and scientism[3] many have identified the need to defend Christianity against pervasive claims that modern minds cannot believe in the ancient claims of Christianity because many of those claims appear unscientific or outright impossible and are therefore unbelievable. After all how can the modern mind believe in a 7 day creation and a 6000 year old universe; and an original Adam and Eve when the modern scientific community is telling you the universe is some 13.7 billion years old, and humans were not created, they evolved?

Hell is for liars Part 2: The Heart of the Lie

Posted on June 2, 2018 by Duane Caldwell

Satan’s advice: Be proud

In part 1 of this series, I pointed out that God will not allow liars into heaven (Rev 21.8), and then pointed out some of the lies that will keep you from heaven. Some wanted to make a distinction between those actively lying by trying to deceive, and those duped by the lies. But those who read closely understood that objection was answered implicitly with the analogy of poison: It doesn’t matter if you drink poison because someone lied to you and told you it was a harmless soft drink; Or because you’ve deceived yourself and are now convinced that the poison – say arsenic – is not really poison at all, and it won’t harm you, in fact it’s good for you so you consume lots of it. (Think “did God really say…” Gen 3.1) – regardless of what causes you to drink the poison whether you’re actively deceiving (yourself) or are merely deceived and believe the lie, if you drink it, you will die. Continue Reading

The complex science that explains consciousness: Faith

Posted on September 29, 2016 by Duane Caldwell

Consciousness poses a serious, and in fact insurmountable problem for materialist scientists – which includes of course materialist evolutionists.[1] Brain researcher Robert Lawrence Kuhn captures the problem succinctly: “Try as I have for decades, I cannot remotely imagine how physical matter can become mentally aware.”[2] By “mentally aware” he is referring to consciousness, which he defines as:

“Consciousness is what mental activity feels like inside. The private inner experience of sensation, emotion and thought.”[3]
Robert Lawrence Kuhn

Which is probably the easiest way to view consciousness.[4] But this easy to understand concept of consciousness masks a fundamental conundrum: matter is not conscious. If matter is all that exists, and thus people are no more than intricately structured matter, why are we conscious?

The problem is akin to the origin of life for such materialists. The origin of life problem, briefly stated, is how did non-living matter – an arrangement of molecules – become a living creature? The problem of consciousness is very similar: How does an arrangement of non-consciousness matter become conscious? For the record, materialists have no answer to either question.

Before looking further into the problem, we need to be clear on how insurmountable a problem consciousness is for those who believe there is nothing beyond the material world. Famed former atheist turned theist Anthony Flew highlighted the problem through the means of a thought experiment: Continue Reading

Science and the Paradox of the Unbelievable

Posted on December 15, 2015 by Duane Caldwell

Artist’s depiction of Earth curving space according to Einstein’s theory of General Relativity while satellite GPB orbits

Christians are often accused of believing the unbelievable. But are they the only ones?

Christians are often accused of believing the unbelievable. One of those “unbelievables” is the claim that the universe was created in 6 days. But is that really unbelievable? Even if it were, are Christians the only ones who believe something that’s unbelievable? Consider this: physicists also believe something once considered unbelievable. If that is true, perhaps the belief of Christians is not as wild and crazy as some think.

Physics and the Unbelievable

Consider the well known phenomenon of gravity. Since Newton published his theory of gravity in the seventeenth century, people have believed in the pull exerted by the force of gravity. Newton is widely credited with being the founder of modern science based on his law of gravity and laws of motion. Newton’s understanding of gravity seems intuitive – of course things are pulled by the force of gravity. Yet scientists today don’t believe his model of gravity. They say that force is not real; it’s something Newton just made up. There is no pull of gravity.

Which leaves those of us who were taught Newton’s theory of gravity as an unchanging “law” of science in a bit of a quandary. We are now told not to believe in a foundational theory of science given to us by the father of modern science. Saying Newton was wrong was once considered unthinkable, much less believable. Yet that is precisely what scientists today are asking us to do. Do you believe them? If you do, you too believe a number of things once considered nonsense by modern scientists as demonstrated below. And if you don’t you’re at odds with modern science. Continue Reading