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Dwight L. Moody once said that if you ever speak about Hell, you’d better have tears in your eyes. Hell is one of those realities that we Christians should not like to think about and if you do, shame on you. It should sadden you greatly that some people have died without God and some will die without God and some people you see every day could die without God.

I had some thoughts on the topic of Hell while watching Smallville recently. (I wonder how many people are thinking where the connection is at this point.) In Season 7, Episode 12, Fracture, Lex has gone to find Clark’s cousin with amnesia. No one knows where he was, but he did get shot there and sent back to Metropolis. The only way to get the information is to have Clark go through an experimental procedure where his brain waves are linked to Lex’s. In other words, he goes inside of Lex’s mind.

While he is there, he encounters Lex’s evil side, that longs to kill him and looks just like the Lex he meets every day. He also meets Lex’s good side, a small kid named Alexander who is constantly hunted down by “Lex” in an attempt to kill his good side that makes him weak.

Towards the end of Clark’s time in Lex’s mind, Lex captures Alexander and takes him away to kill him and while Clark needs to get out, he goes to save Alexander. As this is going on, in the real world, the real Lex has suddenly flatlined as a result of the procedure and Chloe must use her healing powers to save Lex from death or Clark will die also.

As she heals him, Clark has entered a room in “Lex’s” memory that looks like the foyer of Luthor mansion where Alexander is about to be killed. Suddenly, as Chloe begins to use her power, a bright light enters that room and Clark is able to stop Lex and free Alexander. I find this something fascinating.

It’s almost as if the show is saying that if Lex’s good side had died, Lex would die.

That’s, in some ways, what Hell is. Hell is where you have as little as you as possible. As your goodness dies off, you get closer and closer to Hell. Now I don’t think your goodness dies entirely for you still are and you have goodness in being, but you have the bare minimum of such goodness.

I’ll also say I don’t believe in the fiery furnace of Hell. I take that as a metaphor due to Hell being a place of darkness. The point I see is that Hell is a place of judgment and it is the worst place that you can ever think about being. 

If anyone thinks I doubt this, I shall share a story. A few years ago someone IMed me on PALtalk and told me that Saddam’s sons had been found and killed and were saying “Isn’t this great?!” Now, when people who do evil are stopped, I am pleased for that, but I also had a piece of sadness. I realized then that those two had just entered Hell forever, and there would be no escape. 

Think about that some.

Yes. I think it’s just. Yes. I think it’s the best option available. Yes. I do defend the doctrine of Hell.

I don’t get any joy out of it though and I wonder about Christians who would practically love to hold marshmallows over the fires of Hell.

I also then wish I took it more seriously because I know people who are going there.

I speculate as to what people go through there that it could be some theologians are right in saying that Hell and Heaven could be the same place in a sense. However, what people experience as the love of God in Heaven, that is experienced as wrath by those in Hell. They have spent all their lives avoiding God and not bowing a knee to him and for all eternity, they are surrounded by his presence then. That would be Hell. 

Now I also believe that people have a body in Hell, but it is not a glorious one. They could be, in essence, living death. Again, that is speculation and I can’t say for certain what all it would involve. The Bible doesn’t say anything really about that for unbelievers because I don’t see the Bible as trying to address secondary matters we speculate on. It doesn’t give us information for the sake of curiosity but information for the sake of our salvation. 

I suppose as I wrap this up I’ll just give an evangelical call. Dear friends. People are going to Hell every day. Let’s go out there and make a difference to stop that.

Having taken some look as to the idea of the after-death last night, I’d like to look into the nature of the body of the believer. My stance is that our bodies will be, in many ways, the same, although I can anticipate some functions changing in some ways. When we see Christ in the Scriptures, we see him raised in a body that is now glorified, but we are not given the extent of this glorification. 

I do think it could be likely though that Christ’s body is even more glorified in Heaven where the glory of God is round about and that is shown even more through the glory of Christ. I do not believe what I have just written is honestly adequate to convey the thought. A writer normally would not critique his own work, but it’s my hope that the reader realizes the idea of what I said and that I just think it could not be adequately expressed were I to have thousands of pages to write and all the time in the world.

Paul writes in1 Cor. 15 that we do not know what kind of body we will rise up in. I do not think the contention is that we will rise like some creature in fantasy literature or something of that sort. I think it’s that we don’t understand all the ins and the outs of the new body. We do not understand how glorious it would be. Here, we are beset with sicknesses and we have to eliminate waste from our bodies on a regular basis and we are certain such will not exist in the after-death. We just don’t see how that will happen. What of eating? Eating seems to naturally lead to waste. Will we have a glorious metabolism? We really don’t know. 

It is my belief though that we will be what we were meant to be entirely. I happen to have a steel rod on my spine now. It could be that I might somehow have it in Heaven. I do not know for sure. If I do, it won’t be anything that holds me back and if there is any scar that I bear, it will be one of glory. There will be nothing that is ugly about me in Heaven. 

Heaven is the place where we will fully be ourselves and to me, this is one of the great joys. I will be there and realize that, “Yes. This is who I was meant to be all alone.” Many of us today can wonder around in existential quandaries at times pondering if we are doing what we should be doing and who we really are. Why do we do the things that we do? Why do we like the things that we do?

In Heaven, we will know as we are known. I will be able to understand myself and understand God as I ought. In Heaven, everything “fits.” There is nothing out of place. There is perfect love and communion with myself, with my neighbor, and with God.

In fact, if you want to see true human beings, Heaven is the place to see them. Heaven will get rid of all in us that is not human and make it truly human. Heaven will remove all impurities from our souls and we will live as we ought.

The nature of that? We don’t know entirely, but we can be sure it will be done. We are to be conformed to the image of the Son. That doesn’t mean we become deity, but we reflect the character of the Son. The Son is a true human being as well as being deity. So we shall be true human beings.

But what of unbelievers?

That is for tomorrow…..

Aristotle stated that what men seek for its own sake is happiness. Now in talking about happiness, Aristotle did not mean a good feeling. He meant living in conformity to reality. For us, we equate happiness with a feeling and having a good time.

But we can all agree he’s right. We really don’t want to be miserable. Now I think some of us think we deserve to be miserable, but we also celebrate those times of joy. However, it could be that we’ve chased after the feeling of happiness instead of true happiness in regards to holiness.

Do we want to have that feeling of happiness as we call it? Yes we do. Yet, we reject holiness. Why? Because deep down, we really don’t think it’ll make us happy. We reject holiness as that which gets in the way of happiness, which shows how far we’ve fallen from the ancient worldview. If you were an ancient, virtue was something commendable. Virtue was seen as a key to living the good life. For us, morality seems to get in the way of living a good life.

We want to say that’s only for the non-Christian, but if we were honest with ourselves, we’d find that we are the same way. We don’t want to be holy like that either. We are very quick to excuse our own little pet sins because they will make us happy and if we gave them up, then we wouldn’t be happy.

We are creatures that don’t like change also. Holiness requires it though. It requires that we repent of our sinful ways and go and live a proper way. Throughout the book of Leviticus, we hear God telling the people “Be holy, because I am holy.” We might think that has changed in the NT, but it hasn’t. Hebrews 12 says God disciplines us to make us holy and that without holiness, no one will see the Lord.

I thought about this also with a friend asking me last night about the afterlife for unbelievers and how I said that the wrath of God could be actually love to the unbelievers but they experience it as wrath. He told me that unbelievers are separated from God right now and we don’t think we’re experiencing wrath. What’s different there?

I think about that and think the problem could be we are so fallen we don’t even realize we are fallen. We actually think our state is normal and we’ve fooled ourselves in that regards simply because we do not have a picture of holiness around us. Yet when holiness enters, things change. How many jokes have been made about the family turning off the TV set and hiding some of the movies they have before the preacher comes over to visit?

Also, part of our understanding of morality is because the world has been Christianized. I was talking to a friend of mine today and telling her that the idea of seeing a girl as simply an object in a marriage seems so bizarre to me. The truth is though, this is the way it would have been often in ancient times. When Paul wrote Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3, he wrote something earth-shattering. We have grown up with the gospel so long that we’ve been familiarized with us and its shocking aspects no longer shock us.

In the ancient society, a female child could willingly be left for dead and the greatest philosophers even approved of this. Christianity changed all of that. One reason the Christian population grew so fast is because of their treatment of women. They opposed the above practice and opposed abortion as well meaning they had more women. More women meant more reproduction.

Thus, even if one isn’t a Christian, one can often live in a world where the Christian ethic is the norm of society and internalize that anyway apart from the metaphysical foundation that it has. The truth is though that that ethic is something that radically changed the world when it was unleashed.

Maybe if we really grasped that holiness, we would see how far we have fallen. In fact, for the people that are normally seen as saints, they would be the first ones to tell you of how aware they were of their own sinfulness. The closer they got to God in our eyes, the more they realized how far away they were. 

Holiness though, if Christianity is true, is essential to our happiness and we need to be in a position where we want it. Wanting it though will mean abandoning sin in our lives and admitting our own past sins. It’s not a price we want to pay, but do we really want to be happy? If God is the source of all joy, we will not find happiness on our terms. It will only be on his.

Today, I first off did my civic duty by going and voting. I did vote for McCain of course. I’ve posted my thoughts on Obama’s abortion stance and his socialistic policies greatly concern me. Being one politically interested, I went to see An American Carol tonight with a friend of mine. Now some parts were a bit corny I thought, but overall, I did enjoy the film.

For those who don’t know, this is a conservative film done by conservatives as a parody of Michael Moore’s films. In a variation of the Christmas Carol classic by Dickens, Michael Malone is visited by John F. Kennedy who tells him that he stood up for America and believed in our nation. To teach Malone true patriotism, Kennedy will have him visited by three spirits.

I’ll grant Kennedy was not my favorite president. He was one though who did believe in using tax cuts and even saw McCarthy as a patriot. Also, for his war service, he was a hero and no one can deny that. I deplore much of what Kennedy did in office, but I do get admiration when I hear about some of the good things he did and how he risked his life to save his fellow soldiers.

The first one to visit Malone is General Patton who is played by Kelsey Grammer. Grammer does excellent. He comes across as a true soldier would who doesn’t hesitate to deal with the enemy and believes in America. It’s a performance that leaves one wanting to go out and fight for the greater causes that are out there and ponder that yes, this truly is the greatest nation on Earth. 

Patton shows Malone anti-war demonstrations going back to F.D.R. and how the Neville Chamberlain technique doesn’t work. Dictators and others who are just evil don’t understand peace talks. Let it be clear. No one likes war. No one should at least. Sometimes though, we have to do things we don’t like to achieve greater goods. 

Patton also took Malone to a university showing the indoctrination that is going on. It would be unbelievable if one didn’t see signs of it going on. Historical revisionism is now a reality and the more young people I talk to, and I speak as one of them even, the more I am convinced we are raising up a generation that doesn’t know how to think.

Most amusing in this part is the scene with the zombie ACLU lawyers trying to take down the Ten Commandments from a courthouse. The scene is made to be like a Resident Evil game with having to shoot down the enemy. The truth is that often times the enemy is right in our midst and that sadly, in the idea of not wanting to offend anyone, we have left ourselves open many times. When my Dad and I flew to New York once, we were pulled out of line by security for a check. I wasn’t bothered by it at all. (Fortunately, I had a card with me to explain my back having steel setting off security.) In fact, I was honored by it. I was proud to know that people were out there trying to keep me safe. I don’t know about you all, but when I fly, I want to feel safe on a plane. 

Malone also goes to see Bill O’Reilly who is interviewing “Roise O’Connell” making a video about Radical Christians. The whole video shows the way Christianity is nothing like Islam and is not the threat it is often thought to be. The idea of Christians taking over planes with crosses and Bibles or nuns blowing up buses is ludicrous.

The idea of Islamic terrorists taking over cockpits and blowing up buses isn’t.

The next spirit that visits Malone and only briefly is the spirit of George Washington who talks about the church he attended and how he prayed there often. He shows Malone the remains of 9-11 and how 3,000 innocent human beings died that day along with the people who tried to rescue them. Let us be sure of this. We will never forget that day. For those interested, Washington was played by Jon Voight. 

The final was the Angel of Death who was played by country singer Trace Adkins. Adkins takes Malone to a Hollywood that has been taken over by Muslims. Then, he takes him to a Detroit that has been hit by a nuclear strike with Malone as a victim being laughed at. After all of this, Malone changes his ways and does so just in time to foil a terrorist plot and renounce a gathering he had had to remove the celebration of the 4th of July.

Overall, I was very pleased with this film. While it was a bit corny at times, I found myself thinking “What did go into the history of this great nation of mine?” I found myself thinking maybe it is time I started digging a little bit more. This election has increased my interest in politics, but one dare not have an interest in American politics in America unless they have an interest in America. Politics should be about making a good society. Are we doing our part in America to make a good society?

I was talking to a friend today about doctrine and pondering something that I’d heard Greg Koukl once say on the Trinity. Koukl says that he’s only heard one sermon on the Trinity and he was the one who preached it. I could say the same thing. Churches today do not give sermons on topics of doctrine. Instead, it is all application.

At my old church, I remember being in Sunday School and going through the book of Joshua and it seemed that the only reason the book of Joshua was written so that Israel would know to obey God. Now I realize that that was an application they should have drawn out of the book, but there is much more to Joshua such as knowing the covenant nature of God and his workings through history to keep that covenant.

If all we are told is to obey God, that frankly won’t be enough. Obedience to God entails a number of things we need to understand. What kind of God are we obeying? What is his nature? Why should we obey? What are the consequences for disobeying? What are the rewards for obeying? What is the nature of sin in disobedience?

What we have to understand is that in following through with an application, there is always a reason why we are doing what we do. Consider this especially in the area of sexual ethics. Our young people are simply told “True Love Waits.” Why are we to not have sex before marriage? Well, the Bible says not to and you could experience such guilt and shame and get pregnant or get an STD.

I have this strange inkling that if that is all that a guy and girl have in their heads along with a few verses from Paul, that when they’re alone at his apartment one night and are watching a romantic DVD, that it’s not going to be enough and their passion will take over and it will be quite easy for them to reason away what they should do.

Not only that, if they don’t have any of the consequences mentioned, they could start thinking that the church was wrong on that. If the church was wrong on that, well what else could they be wrong on? Could it be that the church is simply a controlling organization that is wanting to hold back its members from pleasure?

Now all that was said is well and good to a point, but the kids need more. They need to know the nature of sin and the nature of sex and why sex without marriage is sin. What does it mean to be in a covenant? What does it mean to love someone? Is sex simply a physical action or does it involve more than just the bodies? 

All of the applications that we are to have are not out there floating in the void. They are based on doctrines and those doctrines are the ones not taught. What does the average church member know about the doctrine of the Trinity? What do they know about the atonement? What do they know about the view of Scripture? What do they know about the Problem of Evil?

That last one is especially one that the average Christian needs. One of the biggest reasons people apostasize from the faith for is the Problem of Evil. They are not equipped in their worldview to have a place where evil fits in. Then, lo and behold, here comes some great evil into their life and they throw the faith away and spend their lives railing against a God they don’t even think exists but never cared about them anyway.

Why do we have just application though? Could it be that we often see ourselves as just machines in a naturalistic universe? We are not human beings but human doings? We describe ourselves not by our ontology but by our function? All we are are creatures that are meant to perform a certain way. Let us dare not ask fundamental questions about reality. Let’s talk about being good, but let us dare not sit around and discuss what goodness itself is.

Now of course, in saying all of this, I am not saying I am against application. It’s definitely needed. My concern is that we have the cart before the horse. Application is built on the deeper doctrines. Because X is true in a Christian worldview, then you do or don’t do Y. Without that, we simply have a religion where the goal is to be a good person and if that’s the case, then why not say the good Muslim is saved or the good atheist?

I look forward to the day when we hear more of doctrine. Could it be that when we do that, we might even see more of people acting like Christ?

Readers of my blog know that I recently reviewed the movie “Religulous” here. I emailed a group that Bill Maher talked to in the movie, the Trucker’s Chapel, this morning before leaving for work in the hopes that eventually I and some others could go and train some of the truckers there in the hopes that the next time a Bill Maher comes by, they will be ready.

Will this happen? I don’t know. It’s up to them. Nevertheless, as an apologist, I believe this is the way to be. Yes. I’m supposed to be out there answering the critics, and I am doing such. However, a large part of what I do is equipping the saints so that they will be all the more prepared when they go to the Starbucks or are in the locker room or are standing around the water cooler. 

I realize this as SHOULD everyone in ministry. We do what we do because others don’t always have the drive, time, ability, etc. Many of us might have basic skills in medicine, for instance, but when it comes to a more serious disease, we go out to those who are skilled as doctors. While you could see them when you have a mere case of the sniffles, they are there more for when you have a serious disease that you can’t handle on your own.

For the Christian though, he is called to certain capacities by accepting Christ. He is called to evangelize even if he is not necessarily an evangelist. He is called to encourage and counsel, even if he is not a professional counselor. He is called to answer the skeptics, even if he is not meant to be a professional apologist.

What is my hope then in what I do? I’m not out to create professional apologists, though if some come along, I have no complaints! My hope is to get the average man on the street prepared. There has been a recent upsurge in attacks on the faith. We have the new atheists out there writing. We have movies like Religulous and even before that, the Da Vinci Code, which was also a book, and the popular internet movie “Zeitgeist.”

I don’t expect the attacks on the faith to decrease but to increase.

75% of our students leave the church and go off to college and lose their faith. Many of the books of the new atheists are prominently known. The Mormon church claims to baptize a Baptist church every week and if they continue growing at the rate they are, they will soon be on the path of being their own world religion.

Why is this happening?

It’s because we dropped the ball.

We ran into an emotional bunker. Christianity does involve emotions, but it is not purely an emotional event. It is rooted in truth, which is intellectual. Christianity makes claims about the real world. It tells you certain things about the universe, morality, the nature of human beings, etc. It is an intellectual faith because it is a true faith.

It’s time we acted like it and that requires all of us to do our part and not just the ones that do so professionally. I enjoyed having the Mormons visiting me and my roommate for a number of weeks. However, I realize that while I hopefully planted pebbles in their shoes, what’s going to go happen when they go to the next door?

Let’s suppose that door was slammed in their face. What will that tell them? A Mormon will interpret it as persecution and will say that Satan is trying to block the spread of the restored gospel and this is a sign of it. While not using the terminology of the restored gospel, the Jehovah’s Witnesses will treat a slammed door the same way.

Let’s imagine another scenario.

Let’s suppose they left and thought “Those guys knew their stuff, but the next ones will be easier,” and they find out that there are a couple of people at the next house who know their Bibles and can deal with their claims as well. Let’s suppose that this kind of thing happens consistently. Are the Mormons going to be hesitant to go to talk to a Christian eventually? Will the words of Christians consistently lead them to doubt? Rest assured, seeing Christians that are ignorant consistently doesn’t lead them to doubt.

The Mormons don’t hesitate going door-to-door though. Why should they? The strategy works well and they don’t generally meet informed Christians. What if they did though? What if the new atheists knew that the last people they wanted to encounter were Christians? What if Bill Maher started having his knees shake when he knew that Christians were seeing his movie?

The world is not afraid of us. Why should they be? Until they think we’re a force to be reckoned with, we can expect they will continue.

How do we change this?

Friend. I realize you’re not going to be able to address everyone in the world. I realize who you can address though. You can address that man at Starbucks. You can address the one in the locker room. You can address the one at the water cooler. You can address your children. I also practice this method with my limited scope now. I recently have had two co-workers get interested in Christian apologetics. They’re already talking to their family. The word is spreading.

Will this happen overnight? No. But then, the Mormon church didn’t reach where it was overnight. While we condemn their theology, I sadly think we can learn something from their devotion. When the cults are putting us to shame with their evangelism and study, it’s time we noticed. When atheists are thinking about issues Christians don’t even know exist, it’s time we noticed.

It can happen, but whether it will or not is up to you.

I recently read “The Myth of God Incarnate” edited by John Hick. If there was an argument that was supposed to be persuasive in there, I didn’t see it. It seems to be the idea in non-Christian literature to assume that not only is your opponent’s position completely false, but they have no arguments for it that are worth bringing up. Nowhere will you see the exegesis of John 1:1 or Jesus’s claims of deity even in Mark. I digress though. I wish to discuss another point.

In John Hick’s own essay in the book, he speaks of how the resurrection alone does not prove the deity of Christ. To that, I agree. It’s that Jesus claimed to be God and resurrected that matters. It is not that a resurrection happened but who was resurrected. The resurrection was the vindication of his claim in that they had put him to death as a blasphemer and God raised him showing their claim was wrong.

However, that is also not the point. In this section, Hick cites George Caird with an interesting situation and one point in it I really wish to discuss. Caird wants us to imagine that a good friend who we had good reason to believe was really dead turns out to have been seen to be alive again by reliable witnesses. Caird says in this “You would certainly feel compelled to revise some of your ideas about science.”

Why?

Where did we get this strange idea that miracles means you throw science out the window. Miracles are interactions within the laws of nature that happen to be by God. If I catch an apple falling from a tree, no one thinks that the laws of science need to be re-examined. Instead, they realize an outside interference has set in. Science does not deal with that. Science tells you what happens when there is no interference.

Now it could be that if dead people started consistently coming back to life, then we might have reason to re-examine our science. However, in this case, if we have reason to believe that God performed a miracle, then there is no need to re-examine science. A Christian doctor, for instance, could fully believe that one of his patients was healed in response to prayer, and still go on to the next one and prescribe medication. (If anything, it would change the doctor’s view of prayer and not his view of medicine.)

And in fact, if this kind of event happened, it would be our view of God that would be affected. Some of us would think “You know, God apparently does more miracles in our age than I thought he did.” This would not change many of our fundamental ideas however. We would scarcely doubt upon this happening that God was triune for instance.

Yet as I see an objection like this from Caird, it just leaves me puzzled. I believe a science teacher could see a miracle take place like a resurrection and still go to a class and teach that when people die, their bodies decay. (Granted, said teacher might need to take a few days off from work in order to get past the shock though.)

The fundamental position is then that the only kind of science that will have to be re-examined is a science that is based on a naturalistic worldview that says that such cannot happen. If you live in a world and you think that all that happens is the result of naturalistic processes alone and dead people don’t come back to life, then you most certainly have to re-examine your science. If, on the other hand, you believe in a God who is capable of raising the dead to new life, then there is no need to re-examine your science.

As a Christian, I realize the value of science, but I do not believe it is the ultimate ground of truth and there are objects that don’t work according to scientific processes strictly. While my body works according to them, my typing out these words right now I do not believe to be the result of scientific processes but the result of a free-will decision on my part. (One could argue that my fingers moving and hitting the keys are a result, but I trust that my readers understand the point being made.)

When God interferes, I also don’t see a need to abandon science. Because he happened to impregnate a virgin girl, I see no reason to throw out the idea that generally speaking, sex is essential for reproduction. (I seriously doubt Joseph did also seeing as they had other children. Chances are Joseph and Mary decided to use God’s technique for bringing new life into the world. They had no reason to abandon the belief that children came through sexual reproduction because a virgin birth had taken place in the family.)

It is my hope that good Christian scientists will rise up also who will present such a view to the atheistic community. They will show not only scientific reasons for believing in the existence of God, but just do good science. Their goal will be to point out to the world that they believe in God, but they also believed he created a world of order that can be studied and that does not go against the Christian faith in either way.

Time will tell if my request is answered or not.

I know a friend I’ve commented on before will certainly enjoy this blog. I was thinking of writing on something different for awhile, but then events happened today that made me decide to change my mind. I was at my workplace today on my lunch break reading a book waiting to see if someone else would come by when a friend of mine came in and introduced me to his Dad.

Now I’m pleased to meet his Dad and the first thing I do is give my sympathies. (Hey! I work with this guy! I can’t imagine someone having to have lived with him any longer!) Then my friend tells me that he was trying to explain to his Dad the Law of Noncontradiction.

Anyone who is a teacher out there can imagine the smile I got on my face.

Readers. I have preached, but even when I preach, I am more of a teacher than anything else. If you hear a sermon from me, it will sound more like a seminar session than anything else. My preaching is teaching. I enjoy nothing more really than sitting down and talking with someone about issues of faith and explaining them. In fact, one of my favorite visits from the Mormons was when they asked us questions about the Trinity. My roommate knew at this point, “Stay out of the way.” Once I start on that topic, I’m good to go. 

What made this conversation such a thrill was that since he told me he was trying to explain it to his Dad, I learned something else. That obviously meant that he was talking about this kind of thing outside of our conversations. It was so interesting to him that he found it essential to pass it on to those nearest to him.

It’s so wonderful to see new minds getting interested in these topics and passing them on. One thing I love as a teacher especially is what I call the “Eureka” moment. That’s the time when you can look into a student’s eyes and realize all of a sudden that they get it! The light has shed! It is hard to say who is more excited by that. Is it the teacher or the student?

Things get even better for me though. Not only does this friend tell me that he was trying to explain it to his Dad, but later on he sees me again and asks a question about the topic. Now, not only do I know that he is explaining the stuff and getting into it away from me, he is also wondering about it and already learning to ask questions.

A good teacher loves questions.

I then ask more about the reading. I ask him if his brother is reading that book. “No. He’s reading Case for Christ.” I’m just as pleased! I talk to his brother later and we have a good talk. It starts with Bruce Metzger as that’s the chapter he’s on now so I’m able to point him to other works Metzger has written and we discuss some of the other scholars in that book and I explain that Strobel gives you a good and basic grasp.

Why? When he asked about Metzger’s other works I mentioned “The Bible in Translation” to which he said “Does he just say what he said in Strobel?” I had to explain that he said much more. Strobel is meant to help you get your feet wet really. The good thing Strobel does, and he’s a blessing to the evangelical world for this, is that he shows you were to go for more by interviewing the leading minds in the field.

It is so pleasing though to see other minds getting into this field. Teaching brings that joy. It is passing on the knowledge. Gaining knowledge is excellent, but when you see other people coming to learn that knowledge and pass it on themselves, it makes it all worthwhile. It’s those moments that you most learn why you do what you do.

And it’s something I wouldn’t trade for anything. Teaching. It’s a great joy, and we should thank those who do it and do it well.

Last night, I wrote on the movie “Religulous” and how this is an indictment. Amazingly, the other side keeps saying over and over that they’re not allowed to critique religion or debate it. One wonders where these people are. Religion is hardly treated as sacred any more. You can find several jokes on television shows about religion and our government isn’t exactly friendly to it anymore.

Is my concern with Maher’s *coughs* arguments? No. My concern is that he thinks they’re arguments. Too many times, it seems that these ideas that have been blown out of the water a constant number of times are presented as if they were garlic to Dracula. If we present these, the Christian will have to run and hide from the obvious truth.

Take, for instance, the concept Maher used of the Trinity that was actually modalistic. (And note that the guy defending the Trinity was also using a modalist concept.) One wonders if Maher never thought that the Niceans would catch such an obvious error. You may think that the Niceans were wrong, but they would not overlook, “Guys. God is giving birth to himself in this view.” No. That is actually unipersonalism which is a direct contradiction of Trinitarianism.

What’s sad is not only that this seems to stump Christians, but Maher is convinced that it’s a good point as is whoever was speaking to him. All one would have to do is pick up a book by a Trinitarian Christian scholar and learn what the real view is. I don’t mind people bringing up hard questions to me on my Christianity. I mind them presenting straw men like this and thinking they’ve done something.

This brings me to my point. We need to recover our ground.

Some of you will think I’m an odd duck. (Okay. A lot of you already think that.) There are many times I’ll go to bed at night and be thinking about all the reading I can get in the next day. I simply love learning something new and I get excited and energized by being in a good debate. Most of my money aside from bills, goes to books.

As I write this, I just got finished with a shopping spree on Amazon. I’m having to write a paper for class that’s a philosophical defense of the Trinity and so I ordered some more books with the thoughts of Aquinas and Augustine on the doctrine. Thus, I’m quite excited. I look forward to getting new books and just digesting them. (Although my “to read” pile is enormous now!)

Now I’ll grant you my readers that I need to read more. I need to have more discipline not only in my reading but in my thought life. If any of you dare think for a moment that all I do is read, then please get rid of that idea. In fact, I wish I spent more time reading. I wish I was more capable of focusing my thoughts. I digress, but I did it also so many would have no pre-conceived notions.

I’d like you to think though of a sports team that claims to be a great team. They claim to be #1. The problem is though that when the other teams come to town, this #1 team doesn’t want to play any longer. They accuse the other teams of wanting to destroy their record and they’re just ignorant of their great ability.

Now I realize it’s not a perfect analogy, but I don’t see the church much differently. We have the idea that we have the truth. I agree with it. We think everyone else is wrong. I also agree. The trouble is, we don’t act like it. Imagine if the #1 team never went out on the field to practice but still claimed to be the best. One would think them ludicrous. Are we any better? Do we spend any time practicing through Bible Study, reading, and prayer? (And I say this to myself as well.)

If we have the truth, then we should be glad to enter the area of the intellect. There was a day and age when the church was seen as a bastion of intellectual truth. Now, it’s seen as anything but. The least intelligent people are those who are religious. It is the secularists that have all the brains in the society. 

The truth is that Maher should have been terrified to make such a documentary. He should have wanted to avoid gatherings of Christians like the plague. Instead, he didn’t hesitate to go to them. Why? Because he thought he could bank on the stupidity of Christians and too often, it seems as if he was not disappointed.

Do you think we have the truth? The best way to answer is not with yes or no. The best way to answer is by your actions. Do you think Christ is the truth as he claimed? Then live accordingly. Don’t cower and hide and run into an emotional shell every time some criticism comes up. We need to boldly approach the throne of grace, but we also need to boldly enter the public square and be able to say to the skeptics, “Bring it.”

Imagine if just 20% of the Christian community could do that! What a difference it would make!

Or maybe I just have a pipe dream.

You, my readers, will determine if I do or not.

Many of you by now know that Bill Maher’s new documentary “Religulous” opened up today. At the start, Bill Maher describes himself as a seeker and gives an interesting look at his family history as being one who went to church with a Catholic father and a Jewish mother. Religion was never an integral part of his life. 

Apparently, he never progressed past that stage in his understanding of religion.

It’s really a shame too. As I watched this film, I was deeply troubled. By the “arguments?” No. Not at all. This was a childish level of argumentation. What saddens me is that the Christians he interviewed could not answer his questions. I find it deeply troubling that in the 19th century, B.B. Warfield places apologetics high up on a list of areas Christians are to be knowledgable in. Today, most of us don’t even know what it is.

Now as I say that, I realize that there are limitations. Many of you are students in your own fields and aren’t going to be able to spend most of your time studying your faith. I realize that. If you are a lawyer, for instance, you will need a good study in law. If you are a journalist, you will be studying the stories you write on. However, just as you can know the statistics of your favorite sports team or the plot of your favorite TV series, you can know some serious truths about the religion you hold.

Sadly, too many don’t.

For instance, on his travels, Bill Maher stops at a Trucker’s Chapel. Now I think it’s great that truckers are meeting together and having chapel. The problem is that none of them could really answer his claims. One of them got right up and walked out. Maher asked them why they believe so many things that aren’t taught in their Bibles such as the immaculate conception.

Apparently, Maher has this idea that Protestants believe in that….

And sadly, that wasn’t caught either.

He also asked about faith and described it as believing in something without evidence. This is the common straw man version of faith and the one that I have to deal with on a regular basis. True faith is not believing in something without evidence, (Sorry Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins.) but in trusting that which has shown itself to be reliable.

One of the truckers instead gives his personal testimony. Friends. This is a problem in the church today. We think our personal testimony alone counts as an argument. It doesn’t. It only feeds the mindset of delusion in the mind of the skeptics and makes them think that religion is all about what it does for the holder of the position.

I’m not saying though to throw personal testimonies out entirely. I’ve used them before when dealing with Mormons especially as they place so much emphasis on them. When they give their testimony, I have mine in play also. I prefer the advice of C.S. Lewis though. When you go out and witness, let your arguers go forward first. They will demolish the arguments the people you’re witnessing to are holding to. Then, when that is done, the people with the testimonies can come forward. Testimonies are fine provided they’re not in isolation. I have no problem with saying “Here’s all the reasons why I believe in Jesus, and I can also tell you what a difference following him has made in my life.”

Much of what Maher goes after in this movie is also Pop Christianity. If he wants to go after people that think a voice in their head is God talking to them always, go ahead. If he wants to go after people who think believing something without evidence is a virtue, go ahead. (Note I don’t think that that is what Christianity is but if someone thinks that is the case, then please demolish that idea. Such a view only hurts the rest of us and the cause in the long run.)

Also, the ideas of Christianity shown are often those like the Word of Faith teachers. The only intellectual in the Christian field I respect that I saw interviewed was Francis Collins. Collins is a scientist though. I say that because what kind of questions did Maher ask him? He asked him historical questions. Maher would have been better off to have gone to someone like Ben Witherington III to ask questions about history. Likewise, if he had wanted science questions, he should not go to Witherington, but to Collins.

Maher seems to assume all Christians come from the same stock as well. The belief is that we are all YEC creationists and we are all futurists. This just isn’t so. There are many different beliefs that fall within orthodoxy. There are also good and solid intellectual Christians who will defend each of these views.

When Maher goes to the doctrine of the Trinity, it is hideous. As he is driving in his car talking, someone brings up how the story is that God impregnates Mary who ends up giving birth to him and he dies on a cross for himself. Now I haven’t phrased it exactly, but that is the gist of what was said and all of my readers out there who know the Trinity doctrine are groaning. Indeed, they’re groaning more when Maher points out that that is a good point.

Unfortunately, the only person who answers him on this, is the guy who plays Jesus at the Holy Land experience and he gives a terrible answer of saying that the Trinity is like water. It can be ice, steam, or liquid. I know about the Triple point of water idea, but that is not what most of us have in mind and the problem is this man was giving the idea of Modalism instead and Bill Maher laughs at that view all the while holding to a Modalist interpretation. Both of them had a wrong understanding of the Trinity.

Think about it though friend. When was the last time you were in a church service and the topic under discussion was the doctrine of the Trinity?

The last time for me was probably the last time I preached on the Trinity.

No no no. It’s more important to hear the stuff that relates to what’s going on in your personal life. Don’t get me wrong. It’s important to hear how Christianity works on the practical level, but it should be practiced on that level because of truths that come from a foundational level. Why do we hold to the sacredness of marriage? Well, because we’re Christians. Sorry. That answer won’t cut it. Maybe we should consider what marriage is and what the nature of it really is? (Maybe this would also help us for the same-sex marriage debate?)

Maher’s arguments relating to miracles are also built on a naturalistic worldview. It is amazing that people that approach him don’t question his presuppositions. Did anyone consider asking “Excuse me. Why should I believe miracles can’t take place?” Could Maher have been capable of defending a presupposition of naturalism?

Naturally, he has a view that science and religion contradict. Those sitting next to us at the theater I think found it odd that there was an astronomer at the Vatican. It’s quite natural though. The Vatican had an observatory at the time of Galileo. Science was always important to them. The Galileo debate was more about politics than anything else. Also, Galileo was involved in a number of debates in his life. Most were not with the church. Most were with the secularists of the day who brought the church into it since they could bring about greater punishments. Galileo was messing with Aristotle after all and disrupting the Aristotlean worldview.

Was man at the center of the universe then? Yep. It was also not the place to be. In Aristotle’s system, the outer circles was where God dwelt. If you were in the center, you were away from God. Today, we think it a good thing to be at the center of the universe and we read such an idea back into the medievals. They would not have thought the same.

Bill Maher is also a Christ-myther who tells us how the story of Jesus was also the story of Mithra, Horus, and Krishna.

Sources cited?

Well, he mentions the Egyptian Book of the Dead but says nothing of where in it the story of Horus is found. He also points out how he was crucified as well while saying the book was written in 1280 B.C. Crucifixion though was a punishment of the Phoenicians and it was not around at the time the Book of the Dead was written.

But hey, most of the audience I’m sure will eat it up and accept it. They’re great people of faith after all.

Friends. Bill Maher holds a Christ-myth position and that isn’t even answered by anyone he meets? This should sadden us greatly simply because the Christ myth belief is on the far fringe of scholarship. If you want to be taken seriously in the area of the history of Christianity, you don’t say that you’re a Christ-myther.

Maher also asks about the grand religious buildings and asks if these are the kind of things Jesus would have in mind. In reality, when the Medievals built them, they wanted the worshipper to realize that he was entering a place that was meant to be seen as a place of worship of God. They were designed with great beauty and awe to reflect the image of the one that the people were coming to worship.

Maher also speaks of the idea of judging. He asks if Christ taught us to not judge. Not at all! John 7:24 has him even commanding us to judge. Jesus in Matthew 7:1 is talking about hypocritical judging. Why aren’t people answering this?

The homophobia aspect is also interesting as Maher points to Fred Phelps immediately. One can only twinge as he interviews a girl with a “God hates fags” sign and she says “I don’t hate them, but God does.” (Never mind also that if I heard God hated something and I didn’t, that I’d want to change my stance quickly.) Of course, the Bible doesn’t say that. I don’t hate homosexuals at all. Homosexuality is another matter.

Maher also interviews a Jew and speaks about the things that you could be put to death for in the OT that were violations of the Sabbath. Never mind that this was a society meant to take the holiness of God seriously as a nation that was to reflect him. Why is a man put to death for picking up sticks? This isn’t a simple slip. This is a case of someone who would know the law and was living in defiance of it. If one defied a king in an earthly society, they would face judgment for it. The same in this case. 

Overall though, I think this movie should be seen as a wake-up call to the church. Why was Maher able to make a movie like this? Because much of it sadly represents the true Christian mindset today. Most of our Christians just aren’t equipped. They easily feed ideas that Dawkins and others have about religion and make skeptics out of everyone else. I don’t blame a number of people for being atheists when I see the way Christians are today.

There are people out there like Maher that need to be answered. I realize we can’t all specialize in everything. For instance, interent apologist J.P. Holding and myself work together on a number of projects. We both specialize in different areas and we both realize we can turn to the other when those areas come up. If you don’t know everything in some field, (And who does?) that’s fine. I would hope you would at least be able to point out some flaws in someone’s thinking, recommend a good resource for them, or be able to say something like “That’s a good question. Let me do some research and see what I can find out.”

The future of the church and the future of numerous souls depend on it. Maher’s charge to us is serious. Are we going to accept it or wave the flag of surrender?