In Defense of the Christian Faith

When I first heard about the book The Unshakable Truth: How Can Experience the 12 Essentials of A Relevant Faith by Josh and Sean McDowell, I knew I had to get it. The description on the back cover reads, “A watershed book for every believer wanting to deepen their faith and reveal Christ’s power and relevance to those around them.” While I really liked the book, it was not what I was expecting, in more ways then one. Here is the product description: The name Josh McDowell promises real-life, on-the-street Christian apologetics. McDowell, along with his son, Sean, draws on a lifetime of work to create this comprehensive handbook on what Christians believe, why they believe it, how it is relevant to life, and how they can pass it on to the next generation. The Unshakable Truth is uniquely positioned in the way it presents apologetics relationally, focusing on how right believing affects not only believers but also the people they encounter. The authors help readers… · understa...

Recently, I've been doing what I call a " Compartive Religions " study here on the blog where I focus on one small aspect of a particular religion and compare it to the Bible to see how it measures up. Therefore, I wanted to share the idea behind that by quoting a portion of an article by Greg Laurie  which brings out the point quite well. This particular article is from 2006, but it is still very relevant to today's belief that all religions are the same... The great world religions do not all teach the same thing. And I say that with respect for all people to believe what they choose to believe. We don't need to vilify, threaten or attack one another. We need a civil discourse, and we need to agree to disagree. But on the other hand, let's not foolishly say every religion is teaching the same thing, because they are not. For instance, take these three truths into consideration: Concerning the existence of a personal God. Buddhists deny it altogether. Hin...

Often, when Christians such as Ray Comfort bring up the point that atheists believe something came from nothing, they are told that this is simply not the case. Well, here is proof positive that many do in fact hold to this belief. The following video contains direct quotes from leading atheists on the matter: Here's a brief synopsis of my view on the subject: I believe that something came from Someone, namely God. Genesis 1:1 records, "In the beginning GOD created the heavens and the earth." Is it any wonder that people try to downplay this (remove God from the picture) by saying it all happened by chance from... nothing? Now, I am aware that many atheists will not find the idea of God as a satisfactory explanation for everything we see around us, so I have a few questions for them: 1) If everything we see today came from nothing, how did everything get here? 2) Some say that this "nothingness" is the Big Bang, so where did the Big Bang come from? 3) And ...

Don't forget that one of the strongest apologetics (or defenses) of true Christianity is a man or woman who truly walks with God. This is the kind of person that people notice. This is the kind of person whose opinion becomes respected. A person may have all the right apologetics answers in the world, but if he or she is not walking close with the Lord, his or her answers ultimately mean very little. By contrast, strong answers coming from a person who exudes true commitment to the Lord Jesus is, in my opinion, an apologist in the true biblical sense. ~ Ron Rhodes, Reasoning from the Scriptures with the Catholics

I recently had the chance to review Accessible Apologetics , a curriculum by apologetics speaker and trainer Mikel Del Rosario . Accessible Apologetics is a compilation of Mikel’s teaching notes (based on other apologist’s works and ten years of teaching and training) put into 5 easy-to-understand lessons on defending Christianity. “This class in defending the faith is all about increasing your confidence as a Christian by exploring the reasons and evidences for the faith, and preparing yourself to be a more effective ambassador of Jesus Christ.” Each lesson includes a Power Point presentation, Leaders’ Notes and suggested correspondence follow-ups (before and after class), Student Notes with room for student answers, interactive activities to aid in learning the material, and Student absentee handouts. All of the above make for a very enjoyable 5 to 10 week learning experience in Christian apologetics with your group or church. Lesson 1 - “What is Christian apologetics?” and “Wh...

Today, in our study on comparitive religions , I want to briefly talk about the claims of Jehovah's Witnesses in connection with the Resurrection (I will talk about the Mormon's view next time). I would like to preface this by saying that, as with all my posts on comparative religions, this is just one of may points that could be examined; on it's own, each point is not meant to fully discredit any religion -- rather, we are examining this piece-by-piece in comparision with the Bible in order to reach a conclusion of each religion as a whole. That said, let's move on... Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Jesus was not bodily resurrected from the dead. Instead, they believe that Jesus' body was destroyed in the tomb and His resurrection was immaterial as a result. Do the Scriptures support such an idea? Let's examine a few Scriptures to find out: Peter Preached a bodily Resurrection: Acts 2:25-32 states, "For David speaketh concerning him, I foresaw...

I read this story yesterday at the Baptist Press and I just had to share it for today's Inspiring Story. The names have been changed (by the authors) for privacy and protection. Enjoy! --------  No one notices the young Chinese woman silently crying in the back pew. It's the only place she finds solace from her deep depression and fear of death. She's not even sure why she sits in this church every afternoon; her communist education and Buddhist religion teach against a belief in God. Yet something keeps drawing Lily Wang here. She pulls a Bible from the pew. It's not in her native Mandarin, but she flips it open anyway. She learned to read a little Thai after moving to Thailand a few years ago to teach school, but she hasn't learned enough to really understand this. So many questions cloud her mind that she finally musters enough courage to speak to a man carrying the same book. He brushes past the petite woman and goes about his business. The rejection ...

Have you ever heard someone say that they won't believe in God because it is based on "blind faith"? Or maybe they say, "I believe in science -- that which is testable, observable, and repeatable." In other words, they only believe in what they can see. Many times, even when we know the evidence for Christianity, this phrase can stump Christians. So how do we answer this assertion? The answer is found in the very Scripture which the skeptics use to say that faith is blind: Hebrews 11:1. Let's take a look at it for a moment: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen...." Does this mean that Christians believe in what they can't see? After all, the skeptics will say, "We can't see God." However, if we examine this passage more closely, we can see that this is not what is implied at all. What Hebrews 11 is asserting is that there is substance to faith. It is not just some "blind faith,...