Q25 Faith is believing without evidence, Right?

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

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

A Rational Faith vs An Illogical Atheist

Milan - Resurrection of Lazarus from San Giorgio church

Milan – “Resurrection of Lazarus” from the San Giorgio church

Most of the time I do not bother to respond to the online rantings of atheists. That’s because most are not worthy of a response since they tend to be one of the following:

  • Ad hominem attacks that have nothing to do with the question at hand
  • Fiat statements that are not only completely wrong, but have absolutely no backing evidence in science, reality or truth
  • Gross misstatements or misunderstandings of science whose corrections cannot be explained in a single tweet.

In my experience most atheists online are not seeking the truth. They merely want to pour the nonsense and trash of their worldview on everyone and expect everyone to swallow – hook, line and sinker – the lies they themselves have become accustomed to. Amusingly, they consider themselves bastions of reason and science but always seem to miss it when they themselves are spouting irrational, illogical nonsense. Continue Reading

An Ontological Argument for Hell (and a plea – Be saved!)

Heaven or hell. Both exist. Choose life! Choose heaven.

Perhaps you’ve heard of the ontological argument for the existence of God. If not, I’ve written about it here[1], here[2] and here[3]. But this time, I’m not speaking of the existence of God, I’m speaking of a corollary necessary truth: the ontological argument for the existence of hell.

I should dispense with a technicality up front. “Hell” is actually the holding place of torment for unbelievers until the final judgment (Luke 16.23, Rev 20.13 KJV). Unbelievers are held in hell until the final judgment at the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev 20.11),  whereupon those who have not believed God and trusted in Christ for salvation, but instead have repeatedly rejected God’s gift of salvation, will be tossed in the Lake of Fire (Rev 20.15), there to spend eternity in torment. Since both are places of torment, for the purposes of this article, I will call both “Hell”, though technically, the final, eternal destination of the lost is the Lake of Fire.

Why, you might wonder, would you ever want to prove the existence of hell – that most feared place among those who truly understand it? There are two simple reasons: Continue Reading

Is the Bible full of fantastic creatures? Part 8: The Dragon and The Beast

On May 9, 2012 a Russian-made Sukhoi Superjet 100 on a demonstration flight with 45 souls aboard slammed into Mount Salak south of Jakarta, Indonesia killing all aboard. What has that got to do with the dragon  – the red seven headed dragon – you wonder? Bear with me a bit and I’ll make the connection. But before going into that, for this final installment of the series, let me remind you of a couple of points made in the opening article of the series. 

First, the list of items (reproduced verbatim) that this atheist finds objectionable and unbelievable that this series has addressed:

“He follows a holy book with a jealous & genocidal god, ghosts, zombies, seers, devils, demons, witches, satyrs, unicorns, talking animals, a man who lived in a fish and a 7 headed dragon.”[1]
(Not listed but also covered: The Cockatrice; and thrown in with this article: The Beast of Rev 13.)

As I said in the initial article, it doesn’t concern me that an atheist has a problem with these things. It does, however, concern me that believers in God and those seeking the truth might be challenged by charges like this leveled by unbelieving atheists.  So I wanted to demonstrate there is a clear, rational answer for each item in the list.  In this series, the biblical intent behind each item – if it exists – is explained; and those that don’t exist are identified. Continue Reading

Is the Bible full of fantastic creatures? Part 4: Witches and Ghosts

Some people disbelieve the Bible because they find what I’m calling fantastic creatures – creatures which they believe don’t exist, and thus they conclude the Bible is full of fairy stories and make believe. But nothing could be further from the truth. So in this series we’re looking at the reality behind the creatures which the atheist who tweeted the below finds objectionable:

“He follows a holy book with a jealous & genocidal god, ghosts, zombies, seers, devils, demons, witches, satyrs, unicorns, talking animals, a man who lived in a fish and a 7 headed dragon.”[1]
(Not listed but also covered: The Cockatrice)

And though this is not the season for Halloween, next up we’re looking at witches and ghosts.

Are there Witches in the Bible? 

Continue Reading

Atheist Meme Mistakes: Morality and Sin

Atheist meme mistake: Atheists are illogical about morality and sin

Many atheists proclaim themselves to be bastions of reason and logic. They consider themselves to be free thinkers who are correct in their rejection of God. They believe themselves to be superior in their thinking when it comes to matters concerning God. That’s ironic since it can be easily demonstrated that 1. Many atheist claims are illogical and 2. an atheist cannot live consistently within an atheistic worldview.  Since many will miss this second point, let me emphasize it by repeating it, atheists cannot live consistently within an atheistic worldview. In fact, no one can live consistently within an atheistic worldview. That is a sign that the atheistic worldview is not true.

Case in point: memes on morality and sin. They are problematic for atheists, though atheists apparently have not realized that yet. Let me explain why. Continue Reading

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

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

Hell is for liars

The Christian doctrine of hell:  conscious, painful, separation from God for all eternity for those who refuse God’s salvation. Perhaps the most difficult doctrine to deal with – for both Christians and non-Christians alike. This is such a difficult teaching there are plenty of people, cults and religions who outright deny it. After the denial of the deity of Christ, the doctrine of  hell is one of the first Biblical teachings to go.  In its place – everything from annihilation of the soul to universal salvation. Apparently the doctrine of hell is so scary even annihilation – eternal nonexistence –  is preferable to the Biblical doctrine of hell. According to one account, the Catholic doctrine of purgatory (a temporary place of punishment to pay for any un-forgiven sins) came about because punishment consisting of eternal wrath could not be countenanced by at least one early church father[1]. But the doctrine of purgatory is strictly a Catholic add on teaching – it’s not in the Bible. And it’s not what we’re talking about. Let’s be clear about what we are talking about. Continue Reading

The illogical atheist strikes again

Scientific American recently pondered, Is Lawrence Krauss a Physicist, or Just a Bad  Philosopher?  A very good question indeed considering the fact that the entire premise of Krauss’ recent book “A Universe from Nothing”  apart from being (bad) philosophy masquerading as science[1] is based on the logical fallacy known as “Equivocation.” Equivocation is when you use one word to mean two different things.  This typically results in false and misleading  conclusions – though sometimes the results are ironic and amusing as in Cher’s song “Dark Lady.”    In Cher’s song the fortune teller tells the singer “The man you love is secretly true to someone else who is very close to you.” Normally when you hear the phrase “very close to you” you think of an emotional connection. But by the end of the song, you realize the dark lady was referring to herself, and the “very close” part was physically close – as the two ladies were when the dark lady gave the fortune. The dark lady intentionally misled through the use of an equivocation. Krauss does the same thing – intentionally mislead through an equivocation. Continue Reading