Good morning friends,
Quote of the week:
Of course it is self-defeating for Ehrman at once to say we do not have the original words, and then to claim that the copies we have are incorrect or ridden with errors. How does he know any copies are incorrect if he doesn’t have the original by which to make a comparison? In fact, the only way he could judge that any copies were copied incorrectly, is if he assumes that the original is preserved in the copies, which he then uses as a standard of measure by which to measure specific instances of variation. – Thomas A. Howe, Ph.D., Professor of Bible and Biblical Languages, Southern Evangelical Seminary, 2006
Now, here are your weekly links:
- The Flagellum’s Hook Connects to the Case for a Creator – Reasons to Believe: https://reasons.org/creation/life/the-flagellum-s-hook-connects-to-the-case-for-a-creator
- Street Tactics – Part 5 – Street Tactics involve having a specific set of questions at the ready to keep you in the driver’s seat of a conversation when you’re engaged with a critic of Christianity on a particular topic. Though encounters like these are somewhat “head-to-head” affairs, our tactical maneuvers are meant to provide safety for you in the conversation while encouraging the objector to think more carefully about his complaints or consider problems he may not have been aware of.: https://www.str.org/w/street-tactics-part-5
- Sample clip from ” Origin and Design of the Universe” V030 – YouTube – This is a low-res sample from a DVD Product available from http://www.arn.org. In this talk, Professor Strauss reviews the scientific evidence regarding the origin of the universe. He explains why the Big Bang model is the best model of the beginning of the universe given the current scientific data. Strauss also discusses the physical parameters of the universe that have allowed the universe to exist and provide an environment for supporting life. The “anthropic principle” refers to the observation that these physical parameters seem to be astonishingly well tuned to allow life to exist.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LCXX8SmceU
- The Challenge of History: An Interview with William Lane Craig | Popular Writings | Reasonable Faith – The most distinctive claim about Christianity in relation to other world religions is that Christianity says that God has revealed himself in history. As British theologian, Alan Richardson, has stated: “The Christian faith” is bound up with certain happenings in the past, and if these happenings could be shown never to have occurred, or to have been quite different from the biblical-Christian account of them, then the whole edifice of Christian faith, life and worship would be found to have been built on sand.” At Christmas, we celebrate the central event in world-history that God became man in Jesus Christ. Today this claim is under assault in a variety of ways. Some claim it’s a myth; others assert that it’s a meaningless statement because it is impossible to really know the past. AP asked William Lane Craig, Research Professor in Philosophy at Talbot Theological Seminary, Los Angeles, what he thought about these views.: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/jesus-of-nazareth/the-challenge-of-history-an-interview-with-william-lane-craig
- Why Environmentalism and Animal Rights Are Dependent on a Christian Worldview | Cold Case Christianity: https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/why-environmentalism-and-animal-rights-are-dependent-on-a-christian-worldview/
- Yes, America Had a Christian Founding – The Stream – Why does the U.S. have such a distinctive history? What is exceptional about us? How are we different from “normal countries”, like those in Western Europe, which are mostly content to dissolve their sovereignty in the secretive, autocratic European Union? If you ask most American liberals, and the historians they read, the answers are clear. We aren’t distinctive. We’re not exceptional, except that we embraced “diversity” through mass immigration before Europeans got the memo. We are a normal country, like France or The Netherlands. We’re just in denial about it. It’s the job of our history teachers, and the U.S. courts to banish our old superstitions. To accept that there is nothing providential about American history. And that there was nothing Christian about its founding.: https://stream.org/should-we-just-write-america-off-as-a-botched-godless-experiment/
- Respectfully Engaging with Hindus – Dr. Mikel Del Rosario | Apologetics Guy – Let’s talk about respectfully engaging with Hindus. Why? More than a billion people around the world say they’re Hindus. That’s about 15 percent of the world. So if you haven’t met someone at least interested in some aspect of Hindu culture, you may soon. The more we engage with our neighbors, the more we see that religion is a core part of many people’s lives. I like how Win Corduan once said, “Loving our neighbors means getting to know them. And getting to know them means getting to know their religion.” We need discover what makes their religion attractive to them. Why did they convert? It they were born into it, what keeps them loyal?: https://apologeticsguy.com/2018/08/engaging-with-hindus/
- Does the Bible Conflict with Itself in the Matter of Incest? | Christian Courier: https://christiancourier.com/articles/does-the-bible-conflict-with-itself-in-the-matter-of-incest
- Clearing the Fog: “Christianity Doesn’t Need Evidence Because Faith is Blind.” – Living Waters – Many atheist critiques of Christianity claim that faith is blind, irrational, stupid. In his book The God Delusion, leading atheist Richard Dawkins asserts that faith opposes reason, and calls faith a “delusion,” which he describes as “persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence” (p. 28). A common example used to show that the Bible denigrates evidence is the story of doubting Thomas. In The Selfish Gene, Dawkins writes, “Thomas demanded evidence. . . . The other apostles, whose faith was so strong that they did not need evidence, are held up to us as worthy of imitation” (198). Was Jesus repudiating an evidence-based faith?: https://livingwaters.com/clearing-the-fog/
- Teaching Our Kids to Spot Empty Statements – Mama Bear Apologetics – A word like “unity” only has meaning when coupled with a message of what we are to unify with. Without defining what we are unifying over, it’s just empty words, and people can fill in the details with whatever message they want.: https://mamabearapologetics.com/empty-message-unity/
- Why Didn’t Luke Include the Deaths of Paul, Peter and James in the Book of Acts? | Cold Case Christianity: https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/why-didnt-luke-include-the-deaths-of-paul-peter-and-james-in-the-book-of-acts/
- Why A Megachurch Pastor Would Leave His Faith – YouTube – What questions are raised through his journey that we need to address, and how can we better love people who deconstruct and ultimately deconvert? In this episode, Sean and Scott discuss a book called Goodbye Jesus by former megachurch pastor, now Humanist, Tim Sledge.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbfIupCq73s
- The Christian View of Science and Faith – Views on the relation of science and faith cluster around three basic schools of thought. First, science and faith are perceived to be at war with one another. This is one of the tenets of New Atheism and is also prevalent in some fundamentalist religious groups. Second, science and faith are thought to belong to different domains of human experience and inquiry. Thus they are able to coexist peacefully-so long as they remain separate from one another. A prominent example of this view would be what evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould called non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA).1 The third camp is the most diverse and arguably the most interesting. If science and faith are neither 1) enemies warring with each other, nor 2) strangers ignoring each other, then the logical alternative is that 3) they are some sort of friends aiding each other.: https://exploregod.com/articles/the-christian-view-of-science-and-faith
- Ehrman’s Problem 4: Why Won’t We Abuse Free Will in Heaven? – Clay Jones: https://clayjones.net/2012/01/ehrman%e2%80%99s-problem-4-why-won%e2%80%99t-we-abuse-free-will-in-heaven/
- Hearing God’s Voice – Greg Koukl – Should you be trying to find out how God may be speaking to you so you can make sure you do the right thing? Maybe not.: https://www.str.org/w/hearing-god-s-voice
- Has the New Testament been corrupted? – CARM – The short answer is no. To answer this question in more detail, let me give you some background. The New Testament is an ancient book. During ancient times, there were no Xerox copy machines, and the way the Bible was preserved was through hand-by-hand copying. As a result of this copying process, errors would occur by accident or intention. However, these errors in the text do not affect any major Christian doctrine, such as the Trinity, the Deity of Christ, salvation by faith alone, etc. Unfortunately, we do not have any original copies of any of the books of the New Testament. In other words, we do not have “the original manuscript copy” of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, or an original copy of the Gospel of Matthew, etc.: https://carm.org/has-the-new-testament-been-corrupted
- 3 Syllogistic Arguments For Jesus’ Deity – The Bible teaches in a variety of ways that Jesus Christ is God incarnate. In some places, The Bible couldn’t possibly be more explicit, and it boggles the mind how anyone who takes scripture as the inspired word of God could avoid any conclusion other than that Jesus is divine. In other places, it’s more subtle, and you need to be paying close attention to catch Jesus’ claim to divinity or one the epistles claims to divinity. In other words, there are explicit claims (on both Jesus’ and the epistle writers’ part) that Jesus is God, and there are implicit claims that Jesus is God.: https://crossexamined.org/3-syllogistic-arguments-jesus-deity/
- Killing babies because they’re expensive is wrong – Creation.com – Abortion is wrong. But some women can’t afford a baby. How would you respond?: https://creation.com/en/articles/babies-expense-abortion
- Kennedy Classics – The Dumbing Down of America – YouTube – With summer vacation drawing to a close, millions of kids across America are returning to school. But what are they learning when they get there? The Dumbing Down of America is a bold and provocative message from the late Dr. D. James Kennedy revealing the threats to education in our nation. Scripture Reference: Hebrews 2:1-9. The Bible’s clear that a fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. But God has largely been removed from public education. Educational leaders are pushing an agenda that’s turning our children from faith in God and His purpose for their lives. Let’s take a look at what that agenda is and the solutions put and to it.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V96cpOj3xk8
- What Really Happened At The Council Of Nicea | Reasons for Jesus: https://reasonsforjesus.com/what-really-happened-at-the-council-of-nicea/
- What is the Purpose of Your Life? – YouTube – Frank Turek asks the question from a biblical, philosophical, and historical perspective.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80V1EqhRip0
- Can Christianity Exist Without the Catholic Church? – YouTube – Is the Catholic Bible the true Bible? And can Christianity exist without the Catholic Church? Check out this Q&A clip from the ‘Change My Mind’ 2026 College Tour at the University of North Florida.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRakI8lIzLQ
For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance : that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 1 Corinthians 15:3-6
Blessings to you all