Category Archives: Bible Related

The Lesser of Two Evils

September 24, 2008

There’s a small debate among Christians on whether every sin is just as bad as another one, or if there are certain “levels” of sinning.

I agree with the latter.

Simply it seems the most logically, in the Bible we are told to chose “the lesser of two evils” how can we do that if there is no lesser evil?

Also, just think about it – in our system a killer gets a harsher penality than a thief. Does it feel right that a person who lies is going to receive the same punishment in hell as those who killed?

In the long run, every single sin leads to the same ending, death. In that sense, they’re all equal.

Of course, Jesus offers an alternate truth.

5 Comments

Creation

September 22, 2008

Creation – The Basics

Viewpoints:

Atheistic Evolution

Theistic Evolution

Special Creation

Atheistic Evolution

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Atheistic Evolution – man is the accident and random product of a blind and nonpersonal series of chemical and biological events. All living organisms have developed from the simple to the more complex life forms.

This is just plain wrong. Every organism in creation, even the “simple” ones are amazingly complex. The idea that things like DNA came about randomly is silly. Plus, this still doesn’t explain where the chemical, etc stuff came from in the first place.

Special Creation – man is the direct product from the hand of God and that the statements in Genesis 1 and 2 are to be taken at face value. Genisis 1 and 2 present a clear case for believing in a special twenty four hour six day creation week.

Theistic Evolution – one God, the Creator of matter, who chose the method of evolution to bring all things into existence.

People usually pick this if they want to compromise and fit science into the Bible. The main reason they do this is because the earth is older that Special Creationists can really explain for. However, the reason we got the idea that the earth is old is through testing, and to be perfectly honest our testing methods can be very inaccurate. There is also an idea that the earth was created with an appearance of age, just as Adam and Eve were adults, not children.

Gap Theory -

The theory goes roughly like this:

  • God created the universe billions of years ago.
  • Then the geological ages proposed by evolutionists took place over billions of years of earth’s history.
  • Life-forms arose during that time that are now preserved in the fossil record, and these fossils allegedly verify that the geological ages took place.
  • At the end of the geological ages, Satan rebelled in Heaven and many angels followed him.
  • God then cast Satan down to earth, the earth underwent a huge disaster or cataclysm, and it was left without form and void, with darkness on the face of the deep (as described in Genesis 1:2).
  • God then re-created the earth in the six literal days of creation described in the first chapter of Genesis.

(taken from: http://www.users.bigpond.com/rdoolan/gaptheory.html )

Gap Theory is used to explain the tons of fossils which we have dated (again) and presumed too old. My personal theory – they probably came from the flood.

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There’s my take of Creation. You can probably tell I’m a Special Creationist. ;) (After all, we got the cool name!)

Also posted in Personal Opinion, Ramblings, Studying, Theology – 2 Comments

What It Takes To Be A Christian

September 9, 2008

In my personal devotions I’m going through the book of Romans. Romans Chapter 4 raises an interesting question for me . . .

Can someone who lives nowadays and has never read The Bible be a christian?

I think the answer is yes and in two ways.

1st) The rather obvious answer is that someone can hear the about God and Jesus and believe. They don’t actually have to read about Him to be a Christian. This is what many Roman Catholics do or just new Christians (even in the New Testament.)

However, I think that when someone asks a question like this they don’t want an answer like #1 what they’re wondering is (for example)

2) Can someone on a deserted island be a Christian?

I would say yes again although I would be careful about this.

Creation points to God, (“The heavenly hosts declare the glory of God [Psalms] . . . ) and someone who only has something like that to look at can believe.

Also, just as Abraham “believed and it was accounted to him as Faith” so someone can come to believe in a living God and trust in him and therefore any promises that he would make to humans (including Jesus) however, the chances of someone actually doing this are very slim.

Personally, I think that God will never turn away someone who honestly wants to be a Christian.

And there’s my two cents worth on the matter! Feel free to disagree and leave a polite but argumentative comment. ;)

Also posted in Personal Opinion, Theology – 4 Comments

Promises . . .

September 8, 2008

In our culture we use the phrase “I promise” flippantly.

“Call me tonight?”

“I promise.”

So what if that person doesn’t call.

“Oops, sorry.”

The Bible seems to think that promises are VERY important. I noticed this during singing a psalm on Sunday.

Before this, I knew I shouldn’t make a promise I couldn’t keep and it was better not to promise at all. However, in Pslam 15 it says this,

“He swears (makes a promise) and does not change it, although it hurts him so”

This makes it seem vitally important to keep your word. It’s a pity more of us don’t think about that kind of thing . . .

Also posted in Personal Opinion, Ramblings, Theology – 3 Comments

Predestination vs. Free Will

September 4, 2008

This is a very big, and undecided issue in Christianty and one that I, and my family, has a very decided opinion on.

First, I’d like to say that there is “evidence” for both free will and predesination in the Bible.

Free Will: “Let him come freely and drink of the water of life” rev.

Predestination: “Morever whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”

With this mind, let me point out that although Free Will can be encompassed in my definition of Predesination, Predestination cannot be encompassed in Free Will.

to better understand this, let me define my terms:

Free will – the idea that becoming a Christian is determined only on your own personal choice as a human

Predesination – the idea that God has pre-determined who will be Christians and who will not

I am not trying to present a hypo-calvinist point of view, I don’t believe we’re puppets on a string, instead I think we have free will limited by our nature.

Let me try to illustrate my belief with an example:

Take the following information and baised on just that (no other variables) come to a conclusion:

1) Alison likes to try new foods

2) Mom does not like to try new foods

3) Neither Mom nor Alison has eaten Sushi.

If you were to offer Mom and Alison sushi who do you think would take it? Mom? Alison? Both? Neither?

. . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . .

If you were playing along with my completely hypothetically illustration you would have said Alison.

Now consider this: by coming to that conclusion did you interfer with Alison’s or Mom’s freedom of choice?

Of course not! But from what you knew from them, you were able to predict the outcome quite well.

God, I think most Christians would agree, knows everything. He had a plan from the beginning of time. (To send his Son, this is predicted in Genesis and all throughout the Old Testament) and we’d all agree that God knows us through and through so why is it so strange to think that God wouldn’t be able to know and predict which of us will become Christians and which won’t?

I think the main reason people disagree with Predestination is because they automatically assume that Predestination means we’re being forced against our will to do something. Many also don’t like the idea that Jesus didn’t come to save everyone. Plainly, he didn’t, but that’s a discussion for another time . . .

Also posted in Personal Opinion, Theology – 2 Comments