Showing posts with label salvation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label salvation. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Show Me The Proof!


A frequent argument proclaimed by atheists and agnostics is: "There is no proof of God. Show me some proof."

There are many answers to this. I will discuss two in this post.

First, such non-believers do not want to know the truth, so they simply deny the obvious. This has been true ever since the first men walked the earth.

It was true when the Israelites wandered in the desert; one minute in the presence of God, the next minute seeking their own solutions.

It was also true during the life of Christ that men denied who He was.

In Matthew 12:38-45, Jesus talks about those who see Him in the flesh, hear His words, witness His miracles, and still refuse to believe because He would not show them a sign when they demanded one. Christ said to them,

"An evil and adulterous generation craves for a ​​sign; and yet no ​​sign will be given to it but the ​sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as ​Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will ​the Son of Man be ​three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."

What Jesus meant by this was that He would not be commanded by them, to show the particular sign that they wanted to see. He is God, not the sinner. He is not slave to the sinner, desperately hoping and waiting to be called upon to demonstrate His abilities. Instead, He says, He will demonstrate His divinity according to His timing, according to His plan. Amazingly, He lets them know exactly what to look for as The Sign: His resurrection from the dead.

Secondly, mankind already has many facts, many signs and many wonders that are certain proof of God's existence, they simply choose to deny them. Here are just a few:

1) Creation demands a Creator. Otherwise you must believe that nothing, with no cause, created everything in an orderly way. Not just animals, but space, time, dust, rocks, water, DNA, order itself, laws, mathematics, gravity, and on and on.

2) Evil demands God. What? Yes, I said that correctly. Here is how: You agree that there is evil in the world? Of course you do. But, how can there be evil unless we agree that there is a standard of good outside your opinion and my opinion? This standard of good must be something other than human, or the opinions of good and evil would vary widely, but they do not. This means there must be a Moral Law Giver who transcends humanity, and established the standard for 'good'. This Moral Law Giver is God.

3) The Bible. OK, I can hear some readers moaning already. You will argue, "You can't prove the existence of God by using the Bible." Why not? Can't I use the symphonies of Bach as proof that he was real, or the writings of Benjamin Franklin as proof that he was real? Of course I can, and therefore I can use the Bible, which claims to be the Word of God, as proof that God exists and caused the Bible to be written down.

4) The resurrection of Christ. Some will immediately say, "But there's no proof of that." Oh, yes, there is. First of all, eyewitness testimony is documented in the Bible (there were over 500 witnesses). Non-Biblical sources from contemporaries also establish that something quite unusual happened in Jerusalem after the crucifixion. They Jews, who tried to end the worship of Jesus, could not produce a body. In addition, the followers of Christ, who scattered widely during His trial and crucifixion, came back - bold and certain of their faith. Finally, the resurrection was such a momentous event in human history that the calendar suddenly changed.

These are just a few of the many proofs of God's existence. The most personal, however, is your conscience.

The word conscience means 'with knowledge'. You know that you have violated God's moral standard (the Ten Commandments) every time you stop and think about them.

Consider: how many lies you have told in your life, how many times you have been unjustly angry with others, how many times you have used God's name in a casual or disgusted way (this is blasphemy), or how many times you have taken something (regardless of value) that did not belong to you? If you have done each, you are a liar, a murderer at heart, a blasphemer, and a thief in God's eyes (and these are just four of the Ten Commandments). You know this is true because God placed the knowledge of His absolute good moral code inside you. Your conscience, which is right now telling you that these are wrong, and that (absent salvation) when you stand before Him on Judgement Day, you will be guilty.

You know it by how you feel: ashamed, perhaps embarrassed, convicted. You also know that guilt demands punishment, and the Bible tells us that the punishment for sin is eternity in hell.

If that concerns you, then you should also know that Christ died on the cross, and was resurrected three days later, just as He said He would, as a sign to you and all of humanity that He is the only way of salvation from the coming judgment. Once you understand this, you need do only two things: repent, and make Christ your Lord.

Repentance means to stop in your tracks, recognize that you are a sinner, that you are tired of a lifestyle as a rebel. You are ready to conform to God's desire: To seek after God; To live for God.

Making Christ your Lord means that you will pray to Him, read His Word (the Bible), and obey His commandments. You recognize that He is in charge and that you are ready to allow Him to control your every thought and deed.

If you are ready to repent and surrender, then cry out to Him in prayer. He will hear the prayer of the repentant. Then, read your Bible and do what it says. Find a local church (you can get help here or here). Living Waters also has some material that may help: Save Yourself Some Pain.

Men frequently deny the obvious. The Bible foretells that although men deny God's existence, they will have no excuse on Judgment Day:

"For ​​since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, ​​being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse." Romans 1:20

The time to stop denying is now.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

New Survey Shows Most Self-Described Christians Ignore Biblical Truth


Shortly after Christ was captured by Roman soldiers, at the insistance of the Jewish leaders, He was brought before Pontius Pilate. As the Roman governor of Judea, Pilate could pass sentence on Christ, or free Him.

As Pilate considered the fate of the Savior, he asked Him, "What is truth?"

The Greek word that is translated "truth" is aletheia (pronounced al·ay·thi·a). This word means, essentially: that which is objective in any matter. Another definition is: certainty, fact.

Truth is a question mankind has wrestled with, and, according to a new survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public life, Christians today fail to recognize what is truth.

Before I jump to the results of the survey, let's cover a few Biblical definitions of truth:

  • God is truth (Deut 32:4, Isa 65:16) and His truth is unchanging (Num 23:19, Titus 1:2)
  • The Bible is God's Word (Isa 34:16, Rom 1:2)
  • The Bible is True (Psalm 119:160)
  • Christ is truth (John 1:17)
  • The gospel is truth (Eph 1:13, 1 Thess 2:13)

From this we know that the Bible is the true Word of God, and that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is part of that truth.

What is the gospel of Jesus Christ?

In John 14:6, Jesus answers Thomas about the only path to heaven when He says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me."

Further, as you read the Bible, you discover that the path to Christ is repentance from sin (Matt 4:17, 2 Cor 7:10, Rev 3:3), and surrendering your life to Christ (Rom 6:19, Col 4:1, 1 Cor 7:22).

The Bible also warns us that many people will miss the truth of the gospel. Read Matthew 7:13-14:

"Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it."

It appears that most of America's self-reporting Christians are looking at a wide gate.

Note: The term Christian, as used by the survey, is self-reported. That is, a person is a "Christian" if they call themselves a Christian. This is an objective standard. For the balance of this article, you can assume that I am using the objective standard. However, my desire is that people turn to God's standard (as shown above) and become true Christians.

Consider the fact that this new study finds that most Christians in America believe that you need not be a repentant slave to Christ to obtain salvation.

In fact, an astounding 65% of Christians say that many religions can lead to salvation! Before you dismiss this number and think, "well, there are Episcopal's and Baptists and Lutherans..." that is NOT what the survey respondents meant by "many religions". Upon further questioning, the Pew Forum discovered,

  • More than 8 in 10 say that at least one non-Christian religion can provide Salvation.
  • 69% say that Judaism provides salvation
  • 52% say that salvation can be found in Islam
  • 53% say Hinduism can provide salvation
  • An astonishing 56% say that people with "no religious faith" can still obtain salvation, and
  • Most amazingly, 42% say that atheists can obtain salvation.

How? Well, according to the survey respondents, all of these people can achieve salvation by what they believe or by their actions. What Bible verse is that?

If these self-reported Christians do not understand how others can achieve eternal life, what does that say about their own walk with the Lord?

Please, if your views conflict with the scripture above about the gospel, consider the following passage from Matthew 7:21-23,

"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.

Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?'

And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.'"

The only way we can know the truth... the only way we can share the truth... the only way to obtain salvation is to search out the truth of the gospel in the Bible.

The Bible is truth.
The gospel is truth. Surveys are not. Beliefs are not. Feelings are not.

Know the truth, and share it with others... even those who sit in church with you.