Center for Informed Faith

Some questions come from people who are skeptical about the Christian faith. Some come from believers who have skeptical friends. And some come from believers who are struggling with the issue themselves. Our first question is found in the hearts of all three.

My grandfather was born before the turn of the 20th century. In his lifetime he saw the advent of the automobile, commercial airplanes, and the computer. But he never met a Muslim, a Hindu, a Buddhist, or a Mormon. Our question never occurred to him.

Here is one of the most common ways skeptics justify their skepticism about the Bible. The question is based on the commonplace supposition that contradictions are bad. If you can find a statement I make which disagrees with something I've already said, you'll feel justified in rejecting both. Even though one may be right. Even though they both may be. Why?

My earliest experience with the Bible was leafing through an ancient King James Version my parents kept in the guest room. The fountain-penned family tree calligraphied in the first pages fascinated me. The printed thees and thous made no sense, the begats even less. I assumed the entire thing had been handed from God to man in black leather.

Serving as a summer missionary in East Malaysia in 1979, I was privileged to bring a hundred or so paperback Malay New Testaments to the people. At one church, members stood in a long line to receive a copy. At the end of the line was an elderly woman. She took her Bible from me with trembling hands, held it close to her heart, and wept. I thought of all my Bibles at home gathering dust.

Visitors to Hampton Court in London are amazed by the maze they find there. Bushes form solid walls, head high. In the center sits a guide high on a platform. When pilgrims get lost wandering through the hedges, they look up to this guide, who points them to the next turn on their way.

We all know that Eve ate the apple in the Garden of Eden, so that the Fall is all her fault. Except that Genesis nowhere states that the forbidden fruit was an apple. In fact, unless climatic conditions were much different then in that region, apples would likely not have grown in the area. And Adam was with Eve in the Garden, and ate the fruit as well. What else do we know that we don't?

Can God make a rock so big he can't move it? Can he make two mountains without making a valley in between? Computer programmers have a shorthand statement for such questions: GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). God is not obligated to do that which is logically contradictory, like making a square circle or a red number seven. Such "category mistakes" are not his fault but ours.

Mark Twain is supposed to have said, "It's not the parts of the Bible I don't understand which bother me—it's the parts I do understand." We understand what he meant, even if he never said it. The Bible tells us all we need to know, but seldom all we want to know.

A woman once told me, "If you can prove God loves me, I'll trust him." I asked her if she could prove that her husband loved her, that his words were true and his actions sincere. She admitted she could not.

I will never forget my visit to the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem. Each moment of those hours has haunted me for years. The pile of shoes which is all that remains of thousands of cremation victims; images of living skeletons and sunken eyes; Nazi tattoos on arms and souls.

The week after my first son was born, I was scheduled to preach on Genesis 22 and the story of Abraham's offering of Isaac. I had to change the sermon. As I told the congregation, I thought I didn't understand this story before. Now I knew I didn't.

The book of Joshua presents most readers with a troubling question: how can a God of love command his followers to destroy an entire nation of people?

Every parent knows the question is coming. We asked it of our parents, and they of theirs. Who hasn't stared at the clouds by day or the stars by night and wondered what lies beyond. Where did the world come from? What lies beyond the incomprehensibly vast universe? If there is a God, who made him? If someone made him, how can he be God? Our children's questions are our own.

It has been said that if the mind were simple enough for us to understand it, we would be too simple to understand it. Likewise, if God were simple enough for my finite, fallen mind to understand him, he would not be God. How does a mother explain marriage to her five year old daughter? How does a mathematician explain calculus to his third grade son?

The poet claims of Jesus Christ, "All the armies that have ever marched, all the navies that have ever sailed, all the parliaments that have ever sat, and all the kings that have ever reigned, put together, have not changed life on this earth as much as has that one solitary life." There are more Christians on the planet than adherents of any other faith, so the universal significance of the Christian position regarding the existence and deity of Jesus is clear. But is it justified?

"Jesus is Lord." This is the central affirmation of the Christian faith. Its Greek original is found scrawled on walls in the Roman catacombs and at the heart of the most ancient formulations of faith. When the Empire forced Christians to say "Caesar is Lord" or die, believers by the multiplied thousands chose to die. If presented the same option, we should make the same choice. Why?

Millions of Christians have recited the Apostle's Creed as a basic part of their weekly worship. This fourth-century compendium of basic Christian beliefs, likely edited from documents even older, was not written by the apostles. However, it contains a brief summary of teachings considered to be theirs, and so has been authoritative for centuries. Its fourth clause contains this affirmation: Christ "suffered under Pontius Pilate; was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hell."

Poliomyelitis, or polio, is a disease caused by tiny virus particles which attack the brain and spinal cord. Until this generation, polio was a kind of AIDS in American society. Why is polio not feared as it once was?

The first three questions in this section deal with the intersection of faith and science. So let's lay some groundwork first. Then we'll apply what we discover to creation, evolution, and the miraculous.

Several pejoratives are popular these days. "Liberal," for instance, means by definition to be tolerant or generous. But in Christian theology, it usually depreciates a person's belief in biblical authority or lack thereof. "Secular" means to be connected with the world. Given that God called his creation "very good" (Genesis 1:31), this shouldn't be a bad thing. But it is. And "evolutionist," from a word meaning to develop, has itself evolved to the top (or bottom) of things not to be. Why is this? Why does the subject matter?

A recent survey revealed that 79% of Americans say they believe in miracles. Even among those who seldom or never attend church, 70% believe miracles occur. Nearly everyone has a personal story which he or she considers to be miraculous, but our scientific worldview makes it difficult to tell our stories to each other.

With this essay, we step into the most enduring debate in Christian theology. It's all about a single word, "election." The term means to choose, as in electing a candidate. You "elected" to buy this book, and to read this chapter. In theological use, the word relates to the idea that God chooses (or has chosen) a people or individuals to belong to him in a unique way.

On Sunday morning, September 9, 1973, I asked Jesus Christ to forgive my sins and become my Savior and Lord. But when I finished praying, nothing happened. I saw no lights, I felt no weight lift from my shoulders. My first thought was, "Is that all there is to it?" And my intellectual questions about God didn't evaporate. I still wondered about creation and science, world religions, why God allows evil and suffering. And so I doubted for many months whether my salvation and faith were real.

When Mark Twain buried his beloved daughter Olivia's body he placed over her grave this epitaph: "Warm summer sun, shine kindly here; Warm southern wind, blow softly here; Green sod, lie light, good night, dear heart." He was sure that she was in the grave, that death is all there is. Was he right?

When Ronald Reagan was running for Governor of California, a woman confronted him by his car one day and berated him severely. Finally she said, "I wouldn't vote for you if you were St. Peter." He smiled and replied, "No problem. If I were St. Peter, you wouldn't be living in my district."

Remember the Y2K scare? One problem created by the turn of the millennium was very real. Perhaps you've been to a cemetery and noticed the headstones already in place for the spouse of the deceased, with the birth year followed by 19--. What's now to be done? Some monument companies created epoxies to fill in the numbers, but without much luck. It was a Y2K problem etched in stone.

I will never forget that day. A nine-month-old daughter of one of our church members had fallen victim to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. I was asked to perform the funeral. As I looked into that tiny casket, I suddenly saw the face of my own nine-month-old son. I had to step out of the room and gather myself. My sons are my greatest treasure. I cannot imagine the unspeakable pain of burying one. But death comes to all—some late, some early. What happens to those who die so young?

I spent the summer of 1979 working in East Malaysia as a Baptist student missionary. For the first time in my life, I met people who had never heard the gospel. Some had never even heard the syllables, "Jesus Christ." To them, our Lord's name was as unfamiliar as the ancient Persian kings are to us. Missiologists estimate that as much as one-third of the world's population has no realistic opportunity to know or understand God's offer of salvation through Christ. What happens to them when they die?

Jesus has just healed a demon-possessed man. The amazed crowds began to speculate that he might be the Messiah. His enemies retort that he drives out demons because he is in league with the devil himself. Our Lord responds with the most severe warning in the gospels: "whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; he is guilty of an eternal sin" (Mark 3:29). What did he mean? What is this "unpardonable" sin?

There are 306 biblical verses containing specific references to an angel or angels. A singular angel is mentioned 210 times; angels are found together 96 times. An angel is first mentioned in Scripture when God sends angelic help to Hagar (Genesis 16:7). Angels are last mentioned in Revelation 22:16 when Jesus says, "I have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches."

C. S. Lewis once suggested that we make two mistakes regarding the devil. One is to give him more authority than he deserves—then he can do what he wants. The other is to deny that he exists—then he can do what he wants (The Screwtape Letters). People today typically think of Satan as a symbol of evil, wearing red tights and a tail, the stuff of Saturday cartoons. He's just as happy to be ignored as to be feared.

An African proverb says, "When elephants fight, the grass always loses." In the realm of spiritual warfare, Christians are the "grass": "our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6:12).

In the late 1970's, no issue was more divisive for evangelicals than the "Charismatic" movement and especially the experience called "speaking in tongues." While divisions regarding this phenomenon seem less intense today, confusion still surrounds the issue.

At one time Martin Luther thought the Pope was the Antichrist, and expected Jesus' return during his lifetime. Christopher Columbus thought the world would end in 1656, and that his explorations would lead a Christian army in the final crusade to convert the world. Charles Taze Russell, founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses, predicted the "rapture" in 1910 and the end of the world in 1914.

Someone asked a wise older pastor his view of the "end times." He smiled and said, "The Lord put me on the preparation committee, not the planning committee." He spoke for us all. We cannot control how the Lord chooses to end history. Our theories about the future are just that. The word of God is too practical to focus extensively on an issue which possesses no pragmatic value for our lives. If I could prove a particular theory of the end times to you, would such knowledge change your life today?

President Bush called the tragedy of September 11, 2001 "the first war of the twenty-first century." It was a week of horror and shock of a kind our nation has never experienced. As long as you live, you will never forget where you were or what you were doing on that horrific day.

Church history used to be the subject seminary students dreaded most, because it seemed the least relevant to practical ministry. That was before the denominational era ended and people began visiting and joining churches from completely different faith traditions. Now more than ever, understanding where we come from is crucial to knowing where we're going together.

A Baptist pastor was inviting people in his neighborhood to visit his church. An elderly lady said, "No thank you, young man, I'm a Methodist." "If you don't mind telling me," he asked, "Why are you a Methodist?" "Well," she replied, "you see, my parents were Methodist, my grandparents were Methodist, and my great-grandparents were Methodist." The frustrated young pastor responded, "That's no reason, just because all your relatives are Methodists. What would you do if all your relatives were idiots?" "In that case," she smiled, "I'd probably be a member of your church."

Years ago, a machinist at Ford Motor Company in Detroit became a Christian and was baptized. He took his baptism seriously. He had been stealing parts and tools from Ford for years. The morning after his baptism he took all the stolen parts and tools back to his boss. He explained his situation and his recent conversion and baptism, and asked for forgiveness.

One of the most obvious differences between Christian denominations regards the various leadership roles which churches recognize. Most Baptist churches have deacons but no elders. Presbyterian and Bible churches have both. Catholic and Methodist churches recognize "bishops." Why the differences? What difference do they make?

This is either a very easy or very difficult question. Some think that women have no leadership role in the church, while others believe in equal rights for both genders regardless of what the Bible might teach on the subject. But many churches and believers struggle with this issue and want to know what Scripture says. This essay is for them.

One of my favorite cartoons pictures two men walking out of church wearing nothing but their underwear. One says to the other, "That's the best sermon on money I've ever heard."

William Borden was heir to the Borden dairy fortune, but he abandoned immeasurable wealth to serve God as a foreign missionary. Tragically, he contracted meningitis before reaching his destination and died. Among his possessions was found this scribbled note, summarizing his life's passion: No reserve, no retreat, no regrets. His story and motto captured the heart of a generation, and galvanized thousands for mission service.

Elton Trueblood, the great Christian philosopher, said that every successful organization must have a passion, a philosophy, and a program. What are to be ours?

King David had an affair with Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah. She became pregnant. To cover his sin, eventually he had Uriah killed and took his widow as his own wife. But God knew what he had done. And David's story would never be the same.

Blaise Pascal, the mathematical and spiritual genius, believed that "all the troubles of life come upon us because we refuse to sit quietly for a while each day in our rooms." Oswald Chambers agreed: "Prayer is the way the life of God is nourished. We look upon prayer as a means of getting things for ourselves; the Bible's idea of prayer is that we may get to know God himself." How can we know our Father more fully, by praying more effectively?

Football is America's favorite spectator sport. An English visitor described the game as 22 men in desperate need of rest, being watched by 70,000 people in desperate need of exercise. And the math only gets worse.

In 1870 the Methodists in Indiana were holding their Annual Conference. At one point in the proceedings, the president of the college where they were meeting said, "I think we are living in a very exciting age." The presiding bishop asked him, "What do you see for the future?" The college president responded, "I believe we are coming into a time of great inventions. I believe, for example, that men will fly through the air like birds." The bishop said, "That's heresy! The Bible says that flight is reserved for the angels. We'll have no more such talk here."

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Climate change and the Scriptures

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Global warming is one of the most divisive subjects of our day. Some allege that the entire issue is overblown. Others claim that it is the most crucial moral and practical issue of our time. What are the facts behind the debate? What does the Bible say to this critical subject?