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Should Christians Celebrate Halloween?

It’s that time of year once again, when the air gets crisper, the days get shorter, and for many young Canadians the excitement grows in anticipation of the darkest, spookiest holiday of the year – Halloween

I was raised in a home where it seemed that there was a lot of confusion about whether or not Christians should participate in Halloween. One year we were allowed to participate, the next my parents would feel convicted that we should burn all candy, the next we were allowed to participate as long as we only trick-or-treated at people’s homes we knew, the next we’d burn candy again.

I’m exaggerating somewhat of course, however the conversations, debates and questions kept being discussed and asked year after year in our home – “How should Christians respond to Halloween?” “Is it irresponsible for parents to let their children trick-or-treat?” “What about Christians who refuse any kind of celebration during the season – are they overreacting?”

The Pagan Origin of Halloween

The name “Halloween” comes from the All Saints Day celebration of the early Christian church, a day set aside for the solemn remembrance of the martyrs. All Hallows Eve, the evening before All Saints Day, began the time of remembrance. “All Hallows Eve” was eventually contracted to “Hallow-e’en,” which became “Halloween.”

As Christianity moved through Europe it collided with indigenous pagan cultures and confronted established customs. Pagan holidays and festivals were so entrenched that new converts found them to be a stumbling block to their faith.

To deal with the problem, the organized church would commonly move a distinctively Christian holiday to a spot on the calendar that would directly challenge a pagan holiday. The intent was to counter pagan influences and provide a Christian alternative. But most often the church only succeeded in “Christianizing” a pagan ritual – the ritual was still pagan, but mixed with Christian symbolism. That’s what happened to All Saints Day – it was the original Halloween alternative!

The Celtic people of Europe and Britain were pagan Druids whose major celebrations were marked by the seasons. At the end of the year in northern Europe, people made preparations in order to ensure winter survival by harvesting the crops and culling the herds. Life slowed down as winter brought shortened days and longer nights (darkness), fallow ground, and death. The imagery of death, symbolized by skeletons, skulls, and the colour black, remains prominent in today’s Halloween celebrations.

The pagan Samhain festival (pronounced “sow” “en”) celebrated the final harvest, death, and the onset of winter, for three days – October 31 to November 2. The Celts believed the curtain dividing the living and the dead lifted during Samhain to allow the spirits of the dead to walk among the living – ghosts haunting the earth.

Some embraced the season of haunting by engaging in occult practices such as divination and communication with the dead. They sought “divine” spirits (demons) and the spirits of their ancestors regarding weather forecasts for the coming year, crop expectations, and even romantic prospects. Bobbing for apples was one practice the pagans used to divine the spiritual world’s “blessings” on a couple’s romance.

For others the focus on death, occultism, divination, and the thought of spirits returning to haunt the living, fueled ignorant superstitions and fears. They believed spirits were earthbound until they received a proper send-off with treats – possessions, wealth, food, and drink. Spirits who were not suitably “treated” would “trick” those who had neglected them. The fear of haunting only multiplied if that spirit had been offended during its natural lifetime.

Early Christian converts found family and cultural influence hard to withstand; they were tempted to rejoin the pagan festivals, especially Samhain. Pope Gregory IV reacted to the pagan challenge by moving the celebration of All Saints Day in the ninth century – he set the date at November 1, right in the middle of Samhain.

As the centuries passed, Samhain and All Hallows Eve mixed together. On the one hand, pagan superstitions gave way to “Christianized” superstitions and provided more fodder for fear. People began to understand that the pagan ancestral spirits were demons and the diviners were practicing witchcraft and necromancy. On the other hand, the festival time provided greater opportunity for revelry. Trick-or-treat became a time when roving bands of young hooligans would go house-to-house gathering food and drink for their parties. Stingy householders ran the risk of a “trick” being played on their property from drunken young people.

Today Halloween is almost exclusively a secular holiday, and many who celebrate have no concept of its religious origins or pagan heritage. That’s not to say Halloween has become more wholesome. Children dress up in entertaining costumes, wander the neighborhood in search of candy, and tell each other scary ghost stories; but adults often engage in shameful acts of drunkenness and debauchery.

How should Christians respond?

First, Christians should not respond to Halloween like superstitious pagans. Pagans are superstitious; Christians are enlightened by the truth of God’s Word. Evil spirits are no more active and sinister on Halloween than they are on any other day of the year; in fact, any day is a good day for Satan to prowl about seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter 5:8). But “greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). God has forever “disarmed principalities and powers” through the cross of Christ and “made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them through [Christ]” (Colossians 2:15).

Second, Christians should respond to Halloween with cautionary wisdom. Some people fear the activity of Satanists, but the actual incidents of satanic-associated crime are very low. The real threat on Halloween is from the social problems that attend sinful behavior – drunk driving, pranksters and vandals, and unsupervised children.

Like any other day of the year, Christians should exercise caution as wise stewards of their possessions and protectors of their families. Christian young people would be wise to stay away from most secular Halloween parties since many are breeding grounds for trouble (use discernment). Christian parents can protect their children by keeping them well-supervised and possibly restricting treat consumption to those goodies received from trusted sources.

Third, Christians should respond to Halloween with gospel compassion. The unbelieving, Christ-rejecting world lives in perpetual fear of death. It isn’t just the experience of death, but rather what the Bible calls “a certain terrifying expectation of judgment, and the fury of a fire which will consume [God’s] adversaries” (Hebrews 10:27). Witches, ghosts, and evil spirits are not terrifying; God’s wrath unleashed on the unforgiven sinner – now that is truly terrifying.

Christians should use Halloween and all that it brings to the imagination – death imagery, superstition, expressions of debauched revelry – as an opportunity to engage the unbelieving world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. God has given everyone a conscience that responds to His truth (Romans 2:14-16), and the conscience is the Christian’s ally in the evangelistic enterprise.

Christians should take time to inform the consciences of friends and family with biblical truth seasoned with salt (grace & love) regarding God, the Bible, sin, Christ, future judgment, and the hope of eternal life in Jesus Christ.

How might Christians engage?

There are several different ways Christians might engage in Halloween. Some will adopt a “No Participation” policy. As Christian parents, they don’t want their kids participating in spiritually compromising activities- listening to ghost stories and colouring pictures of witches. They don’t want their kids to dress up in costumes for trick-or-treating or even attending Halloween alternatives. That response naturally raises eyebrows but can provide a good opportunity to share the gospel to those who ask (1 Peter 3:15).

Other Christians will opt for Halloween alternatives called “Harvest Festivals” or “Reformation Festivals” – the kids dress up as farmers, Bible characters, or Reformation heroes. Some churches leave the church building behind and take acts of mercy into their community, “treating” needy families with food baskets, gift cards, and the gospel message.

Finally, some Christians will opt for a limited, non-compromising participation in Halloween. The good news is that there is no burning candy here. After all there’s nothing inherently evil about candy, costumes, or trick-or-treating in the neighbourhood. In fact, all of that can provide a unique gospel opportunity with neighbours. Even handing out candy to neighbourhood children (please don’t be stingy) can improve your reputation among the kids. As long as the costumes are innocent and the behaviour does not dishonour Christ, trick-or-treating can be used to further gospel interests.

Ultimately, participation in Halloween is a matter of conscience before God. Whatever level of Halloween participation you choose, you must honour God by keeping yourself separate from the world and by showing grace, mercy and love to the culture we live in. Halloween provides the Christian with the opportunity to accomplish those things in the gospel. What better time of the year is there to share such a message of hope than Halloween?

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10 Reasons Racism Is Sin

JANUARY 21, 2019  |  Kevin DeYoung 
You can find other articles by Kevin DeYoung here: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/

Most people know that racism is wrong. It’s one of the few things almost everyone agrees on. And yet, I wonder if we (I?) have spent much time considering why it’s wrong.

We can easily make our “I hate racism” opinions known, but perhaps we are just looking for moral high ground, or for pats on the back, or to win friends and influence people, or to prove we’re not like those people, or maybe we are just saying what we’ve always heard everyone say.

As Christians we must think and feel deeply not just the what of the Bible but the why. If racism is so bad, why is it so bad?

Here are ten biblical reasons why racism is sin and offensive to God.

1. We are all made in the image of God (Gen. 1:27). Most Christians know this and believe it, but the implications are more staggering than we might realize. The sign pictured above is not just mean, it is dehumanizing. It tried to rob Irish and blacks of their exalted status as divine image bearers. It tried to make them no different from animals. But of course, as a white man I am no more like God in my being, no more capable of worship, no more made with a divine purpose, no more possessing of worth and deserving of dignity than any other human of any other gender, color, or ethnicity. We are more alike than we are different.

2. We are all sinners corrupted by the fall (Rom. 3:10-20; 5:12-21). Everyone made in the image of God has also had that image tainted and marred by original sin. Our anthropology is as identical as our ontology. Same image, same problem. We are more alike than we are different.

3. We are all, if believers in Jesus, one in Christ (Gal. 3:28). We see from the rest of the New Testament that justification by faith does not eradicate our gender, our vocation, or our ethnicity, but it does relativize all these things. Our first and most important identity is not male or female, American or Russian, black or white, Spanish speaker or French speaker, rich or poor, influential or obscure, but Christian. We are more alike than we are different.

4. Separating peoples was a curse from Babel (Gen. 11:7-9); bringing peoples together was a gift from Pentecost (Acts 2:5-11). The reality of Pentecost may not be possible in every community—after all, Jerusalem had all those people there because of the holy day—but if our inclination is to move in the direction of the punishment of Genesis 11 instead of the blessing of Acts 2 something is wrong.

5. Partiality is a sin (James 2:1). When we treat people unfairly, when we assume the worst about persons and peoples, when we favor one group over another, we do not reflect the God of justice, nor do we honor the Christ who came to save all men.

6. Real love loves as we hope to be loved (Matt. 22:39-40). No one can honestly say that racism treats our neighbor as we would like to be treated.

7. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer (1 John 3:15). Sadly, we can hate without realizing we hate. Hatred does not always manifest itself as implacable rage, and it does not always—or, because of God’s restraining mercy, often—translate into physical murder. But hatred is murder of the heart, because hatred looks at someone else or some other group and thinks, I wish you weren’t around. You are what’s wrong with this world, and the world would be better without people like you. That’s hate, which sounds an awful lot like murder.

8. Love rejoices in what is true and looks for what is best (1 Cor. 13:4-7). You can’t believe all things and hope all things when you assume the worst about people and live your life fueled by prejudice, misguided convictions, and plain old animosity.

9. Christ came to tear down walls between peoples not build them up (Eph. 2:14). This is not a saccharine promise about everyone setting doctrine aside and getting along for Jesus’s sake. Ephesians 2 and 3 are about something much deeper, much more glorious, and much more cruciform. If we who have been made in the same image, born into the world with the same problem, find the same redemption through the same faith in the same Lord, how can we not draw near to each other as members of the same family?

10. Heaven has no room for racism (Rev. 5:9-10; 7:9-12; 22:1-5). Woe to us if our vision of the good life here on earth will be completely undone by the reality of new heavens and new earth yet to come. Antagonism toward people of another color, language, or ethnic background is antagonism toward God himself and his design for eternity.

Christians ought to reject racism, and do what they can to expose it and bring the gospel to bear upon it, not because we love pats on the back for our moral outrage or are desperate for restored moral authority, but because we love God and submit ourselves to the authority of his Word.

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A New Year’s Resolution Every Disciple Needs

Today is the last day of 2018, and everywhere you look you can’t help but see messages and hear invitations to make 2019 a better year. A year to be happier than last year. We probably easily agree that all of us want to be happy. Most of us would even say that we want to live a full and satisfying life, a life of joy. 

Isn’t it great then that God wants us to experience that? Jesus said “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”– John 15:11 So, if we want joy, and Jesus offers us joy, why then does it seem that consistent happiness often eludes us? 

Consider that the earning power of the baby boomers and Gen X’ers, increased dramatically over that of any previous generation in history before them. They have more money, more leisure time, more access to sports, travel, and entertainment than any society has ever experienced and yet these two groups are experiencing a tenfold increase in depression over previous generations. It would be logical then to surmise that if the attainment of stuff and fun experiences did ‘it’ for us, then Canada and the US should be like Disneyland – “The happiest Place on earth”. But it’s not. Why is that? 

I’m convinced that it’s because in this pursuit of joy, we have made it all about ‘me’. We feel that it’s unconditional and doesn’t matter how I live as long as I can keep filling my basket full of goodies. But God says that it’s conditional based not so much of what we do but of what we don’t do. 

In Psalm 1 we see that the blessed man is described by what he avoids. “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers” – Psalm 1:1

Don’t Walk With The World 

The problem with most of us is that we have this habit of walking alongside those who try to give us a different message than what God wants us to hear. Our culture is good at that. The culture pounds into us messages that are anti-God and pro-self everywhere you look. So many messages are bombarded at us, messages that begin to sound so good if were not rooted in God’s word. 

Here is an example of a statement that I abhor being used. Ever hear the words, “just follow your heart”? That phrase is used in social conversations, movies, songs, and the average person quickly nods their heads in agreement as though it is the deepest of truths that the cosmos could provide. However, Jeremiah 17:9 says that “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

If that’s true then how could we trust our own heart to be able to follow it in any matter let alone someone else’s? Yet this is one of the messages that so many of us, even in the church, have swallowed and accepted as fact. The truth is that a blessed man doesn’t walk in that type of council – in other words – doesn’t listen to those messages. And by not listening to the messages a blessed person doesn’t stand with the world.

Don’t Stand With The World

We are in danger of beginning to believe the messages that come at us from all over when we stop walking and we begin to listen more deeply. When we do that we are beginning to pause, stop and stand with the world in their anti-God sentiments. The facts are that standing is much more of a commitment than walking. Walking gives us that chance to keep on going, but standing is a picture of rooting oneself in the world system. 

Don’t Sit With The World

We move from listening to standing with the world and then ultimately to sitting. We move from listening to doing what we are counseled to do and then we become like the scoffers themselves, sitting and offering man’s advice to others through scoffing the truth. Maybe not in words but certainly in actions, which might simply be in not being willing to walk away from the world and stand up for truth. 

Delight In God’s Word

”But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on His law he meditates day and night.” – Psalm 1:2 

Is that you? When God’s Word is read does that brighten up your life? So much so that you can’t help but meditate on it? 

Do you realize that the average family has the television on for over 7 ½ hours a day? And most of us don’t spend more 10 minutes a day in God’s word, and maybe 40 minutes a week attending a worship and fellowship gathering Sunday’s and then we wonder why we’re weak. 

Ponder this question. What if we had to hand in a time sheet to God that showed the time spent with him and time spent elsewhere? How would we do? Would you be embarrassed or ashamed?

It says here that a blessed man delights in the law and meditates on it all the time. So much so that it not only becomes a part of him but it produces a delight in his or her heart, or in other words, a deep satisfying itchy joy that can only be scratched by the hearing of more Word. 

Don’t Just Read the Word, Be Grounded In It

“He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.” – Psalm 1:3

A blessed man or woman has their feet ‘grounded’ by thirst quenching water and nutrient enriched soil. If you have ever seen a satellite picture of river systems you will appreciate this picture here. The land is richest and lushest with life along the banks of the flowing river, but as you move away from the water, life becomes scarcer and scarcer until soon all that’s left is desert unless there is another source of water. 

Throughout history, civilizations were built up around water sources. A herd of deer will risk life and limb to gather around the watering hole in spite of the alligator or lion ready to have it for dinner – water gives life. 

The picture we have here in this psalm is of a continual flowing of refreshing waters that give the tree life. The water flows 24/7 and the tree is able to suck up all it requires to live and not only to live but to produce fruit. 

What burdens my heart though is that I know people who will leave after their 40 – 60 minute fix of God’s word on Sunday and will be so excited about living for Jesus but by that same evening will be drunk or high or back into pornography or fighting with their spouse – again. Maybe they have a complacency with anything to do with spiritual things or maybe it’s simply that they continue to struggle with the things that they were so sure were conquered after getting excited at church on Sunday morning. And they want to change but don’t. Why??? 

It’s because you can’t be watered 40-60 minutes each week and expect to be strengthened, there must be a continual watering. A tree will die without being watered. That is why we need to get involved in reading Gods word, or gathering one or two others who are actively growing in relationship with God to challenge us and keep us accountable and grounded. Don’t expect to grow if you are isolated from others who can speak into your life. The Christian life isn’t a Sunday thing – it’s a lifestyle. 

Don’t be Chaff

In contrast, look at how the wicked are compared to the blessed man. The comparison is that instead of strength and life the wicked are like chaff. Chaff is the husk around the wheat kernel, or the brown skin around a peanut. It is like ‘nothing’ and a quick puff of your breath would simply blow it away. 

That’s why in vs. 5 we see that the wicked can’t stand before God in the judgment or sinners in the congregation of the righteous. “Therefore, the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.” – Psalm 1:5

Imagine standing before God – perfect & Holy. I think we don’t think about that often enough. And in the world that thought is made light of, “Oh I’ll just deal with the man in the sky when the time comes”. But the problem is that you can ‘deal’ with God as easily as you can ‘deal’ with standing before a nuclear bomb as it goes off. You’d lose – every time. 

Imagine standing before God and all you have to show for your life is chaff, nothing to stand on. Well, the wicked can’t stand before God in the end no matter how confident they are today. So, don’t be chaff.

Our world has an expectation about what makes us happy. For that matter they have an expectation about how we are to behave, how we are to act, to think, to be. But it goes against how God has created us to be. We can conform to the world and think that we will be happy and find lasting joy, but ultimately, we will only find that true happiness and joy comes from placing our feet where God has created us to place them, grounded in him.

And one of the most effective ways we can be rooted in him is to immerse ourselves in his word. When you read and study Scripture, remember that it is a lifeline to the Godhead. You are striking your roots deeper and deeper into good life-giving soil and drinking from the living waters. These truths are part of the living water that flows into the roots of our lives. 

Be A Rooted Disciple

So, as we enter a new year, make your New Year’s resolution to be a rooted disciple. Someone who grows deep as you meditate on the word made flesh, Jesus Christ day and night. Causing you to grow so that you bear the fruit of Christ-exalting love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22–23). This is the source of our ‘joy’ in 2019 and beyond. 

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Five Reasons Christians Should Attend Church Weekly

It’s tempting sometimes to want to skip church. Sunday might be the only morning all week we can sleep in, maybe we have chores and errands that need to get done, maybe it’s too much work to get the family up and out the door in the morning, maybe we have that football or soccer practice or maybe we just want to enjoy the beautiful weather outdoors. If we attend church two or three out of every five Sundays, that’s enough, right?

I am in no way trying to ‘guilt’ anyone into attending church, or even telling anyone what they ‘must’ do to be a better Christian. My main purpose for this post is to speak to those who believe that they can grow as a disciple of Jesus Christ outside of a regular, ongoing relationship with a local body of Christ followers. The idea of being a Lone Ranger Christian is not an idea you can find anywhere in the word of God.

At the same time, it’s surprising to me how many Christians struggle with the idea of regular church attendance. If church attendance isn’t one of your top priorities  (following other things that might easily take it’s place), then I’d suggest that our priorities are out of balance.

Let me say here that I completely understand that there are other things that do get in the way that we can’t do much about: such as sickness, maybe there isn’t a church close by, travel, the occasional live Super Bowl game (especially when Seattle is in it), work commitments, etc. But what I am speaking to regarding the priority thing is when I’d rather be on the golf course Sunday mornings all summer, or where I’m finding other ‘options’ in life regularly and consistently become the first choice over regular attendance, believing that they are the priority of my life.

Of course, this isn’t a new problem. Since the beginning of Christianity, the early leaders had to challenge this mindset, saying “Do not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” – Hebrews 10:25

I don’t for a minute believe that it’s about not wanting to be with others. I’d think that it is instead a misunderstanding what being with others means. I say that, because most Christians I know would agree that regular fellowship is important. So, they make it a priority to connect in a small group, or an accountability group or at least get to the monthly men’s breakfast ritually, believing all the while that they are fulfilling the Hebrews 10:25 directive. But what if that’s not the case? What if we are actually not living out what we’re told to do in Hebrews and so are missing out on a great blessing?

If that’s the case, we may need to fundamentally change our thinking about what ‘going’ to church means in order to obey a directive given in God’s word and to appreciate the great gift that God has given us in being part of his body in a community of fellow believers.

I think part of the issue stems from the way we think about church attendance in the first place. Many of us think about church as something we have to do; that it’s another thing to check off our weekly checklists. Our view toward church attendance can begin to be transformed, however, when we consider a few important things that remind us of the privilege of meeting each week specifically to focus on God and his people.

WE NEED COMMUNITY

Firstly, it is important to make it a weekly habit of meeting with God’s family because if we truly want to grow as Christians, fellowshipping with other believers, hearing the Word of God, and worshipping the Lord are the perfect places to begin. Of course, personal bible study and prayer are integral as well, but worshipping God corporately provides us a unique opportunity to see what God is doing in the lives of his people in the wider church community.

Weekly attendance puts a check on our cultural tendencies to value personal time over community. Think about what Jesus calls those who would follow him to do with their lives.“If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, and follow me.” – Luke 9:23. In many cases this would involve giving up our wish to keep all our time to ourselves. One important aspect of church attendance, then, is for us to interact with other believers and see how God is working in their lives. It’s an opportunity to value community.

WE NEED TO BE ENCOURAGED

The early church set the pattern for what this meeting together thing looked like. “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer – Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts” – Acts 2:42; 46

It is good to meet in small groups of Christian community, such as in each other’s homes, coffee shops, pubs or other small gathering places regularly, that is healthy and something to be encouraged as we see practiced in the daily meeting in homes the early church was engaging in. At the same time however, it shouldn’t be overlooked that as they met daily in their homes, they also met weekly in the temple courts. It seems that they gathered this way at the start of the week to be encouraged before scattering into smaller communities the rest of the week.

In Jerusalem during this time, the temple court was the place where the wider community gathered, both the Jews and the Christians, but as the church spread in other communities the synagogue became the common gathering place where they gathered on a weekly basis to worship, encourage each other and learn together, at least until the Christians were forced to relocate. But even when that happened they would still meet corporately wherever they could find space.

In fact, Paul and the other Apostle’s letters were sent to the many church communities that gathered in various cities to be read aloud ‘together’. The idea of Church meant getting together with other believers to worship Jesus Christ, hear the Scriptures, and encourage one another in the faith.

Wherever it is we meet, the act of gathering each week allows us to give and receive encouragement before we scatter out into the ‘world’ to face the challenges of the week ahead.

WE NEED THE LEADERSHIP PROVIDED

Because of the individualistic culture most of us have grown up in, one of the things often missed in this discussion is that the gathering in a corporate body allowed for the church to function as it was designed to function. Three of these functions were put in place by Jesus to provide a spiritual covering or protection for the flock, to offer some form of spiritual and community accountability, and to give the flock an opportunity to submit to Godly leadership.

Not all of us are called to church leadership, and so we should submit to, and serve whoever God has called to lead at the place we find ourselves. “Remember your leaders who taught you the word of God. Think of all the good that has come from their lives, and follow the example of their faith. – Obey your spiritual leaders, and do what they say. Their work is to watch over your souls, and they are accountable to God. Give them reason to do this with joy and not with sorrow. That would certainly not be for your benefit.” – Hebrews 13:7; 17

WE NEED EACH OTHER 

Christians need God, but we also need each other. All of us long for community and connection with others. It fulfills something inside of us to do life with others, encourage each other and be authentically involved in each other’s lives. Christian TV, podcasts, books and conferences are wonderful additions to our spiritual lives, but nothing can take the place of consistent accountable and weekly vision casting Christian community provides when we gather as the local church.

Granted, it can be messy when we step into (and sometimes onto) each other’s lives. We are all human, and no one is perfect. So, it requires effort and intentionality and grace from God to do life together – even as believers. But gathering regularly with others becomes a refining process whereby we help each other, pray for each other and encourage each other to want to follow Christ more wholeheartedly. That’s why a healthy church family member learns to repent often, forgive freely, and extend grace continually.  It is a truly beautiful thing.

WE NEED TO BE INVOLVED

Church is the place where believers can love one another, encourage one another, “spur” one another to love and good works, serve one another, instruct one another, honour one another, and be kind and compassionate to one another.

When a person trusts Jesus Christ for salvation, he or she is made a member of the body of Christ and for a church body to function properly, all of its “body parts” need to be present and working.

“For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, ‘Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,’ that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell?  But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose.  If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.” – 1 Corinthians 12:14-20

It’s not enough to just attend a church; we should be involved in some type of ministry to others, using the spiritual gifts God has given us, “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” – Ephesians 4:11-13

The truth is, a believer will never reach full spiritual maturity without having that outlet for his or her gifts, and the full expression of the gifts can’t be seen when alone and are limited in small groups settings. For these reasons and more, church attendance, participation, and fellowship should be a regular aspect of a believer’s life.

At the same time, please know that I am not saying that weekly church attendance is “required” for believers, but someone who belongs to Christ should have a desire to worship God, receive his Word, and fellowship with other believers.So, make weekly attendance a priority. You’ll be blessed and encouraged because of it.

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Should Christians Celebrate Christmas?

The debate about whether or not Christians should celebrate Christmas has been raging for centuries. There are equally sincere and committed Christians on both sides of the issue, each with multiple reasons why or why not Christmas should be celebrated.

It’s Really Paganism In A Different Skin

One argument against Christmas is that the traditions surrounding the holiday have origins in paganism. I spent a lot of time searching for reliable information on this topic but found it quite difficult because the origins of many of our traditions are so obscure that sources often contradict one another. Traditions like bells, candles, holly, and yuletide decorations are mentioned in the histories of pagan worship, but the use of these items in your home certainly doesn’t indicate a return to paganism.

While there are definitely pagan roots to some traditions, there are many more traditions associated with the true meaning of Christmas. Bells are played to ring out the great news, candles are lit to remind us that Christ is the Light of the world, a star is placed on the top of a Christmas tree to remember the Star of Bethlehem, and gifts are exchanged to remind us of the gifts of the Magi to Jesus, the greatest gift of God to mankind.

Even still, one of the reasons given to not celebrate the season does seem to carry weight. It seems that the day we currently celebrate the birth of Christ is connected to a pagan festival known as Saturnalia. Keep in mind that often, in these types of arguments, supposed facts are thrown around without establishing the truth behind a claim made.

Such is the case with the argument used to support pagan roots with Easter. The argument against the celebration of Easter is that the word Easter itself, and as a consequence the celebration of that holiday, comes from the worship of the goddess Ishtar. The problem however is that there is no evidence to support that claim, they are just two words that sound similar and so has entered into a kind of ‘Christian urban legend’ as though it was a piece of factual history even though it is not. But in the case of Christmas, the claim that Christmas is connected to the pagan festival Saturnalia, is actually true – but not for the reasons most would think.

The Smoking Gun – Saturnalia

Given the connection, there are some who claim that the ancient celebration of Saturnalia is the smoking gun that proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that Christmas is pagan.

Brief history lesson: The Saturnalia holiday was a week-long Roman festival to honour the god Saturn, starting on December 17, it fell within what we now call the Christmas season. For most of history, debauchery seemed to dominate celebrations of the holiday; in fact, the word Saturnalia became synonymous with immorality and carousing.

Still, though the Christian understanding of Christmas is not about immorality and carousing, some Saturnalia customs do come across as hedonistic perversions of Christmas traditions to the modern eye. For instance, singing from house to house naked (glad we don’t do that one in Canada), feasting excessively, eating baked goods shaped like people, and exchanging bawdy gifts. The truth is that in reality, there’s good historical evidence suggesting that these events were actually reformed, absorbed, and transformed over time as a result of Christmas’ popularity overtaking that of Saturnalia, not Saturnalia customs influencing the Christmas celebrations.

I found it interesting as I did my research, that the early Christian’s motive for celebrating Jesus’ birth on December 25 was the same that inspires modern Christians and churches to hold “Fall Festivals” or “Bible Costume Parties” on October 31. In other words, to provide a spiritually positive alternative to what is perceived as a pagan celebration. Back then, over time as the Roman Empire ‘Christianized’, customs associated with Saturnalia were ‘cleaned up’ and absorbed into the celebration of Christmas.

And it wasn’t just Saturnalia – another Roman holiday, Sol Invictus, was also gradually absorbed by Christmas. Sol Invictus (“Invincible Sun”) celebrated, on December 25, the renewing of the Sun King and was linked to the winter solstice.

It’s no secret then that the date, traditions, and long-term history of Christmas are connected to the pagan holidays of Saturnalia and Sol Invictus. Yet, like a modern Canadian family celebrating a harvest festival and dressing up like a bible character or great reformer of the past on October 31, it’s the people celebrating who decide what the celebration means. Early Christians chose December 25 as the day to celebrate the birth of Jesus and that decision of theirs continues to this day. So, though Christmas and Saturnalia may be historical neighbours with indirect connections, they are not the same holiday, never were, and of course never will be.

Since We Don’t See December 25th In The Bible, We Shouldn’t Celebrate Christmas On That Day 

Furthering the debate are those who point to the fact that the Bible doesn’t give us the date of Christ’s birth – which is certainly true. December 25th may not be even close to the time Jesus was born, and arguments on both sides are legion, some relating to climate in Israel, the practices of shepherds in winter, and the dates of Roman census-taking. While none of these points are without a certain amount of conjecture, the fact remains that the Bible doesn’t tell us when Jesus was born. Some see this as proof positive that God didn’t want us to celebrate the birth, while others see the Bible’s silence on the issue as tacit approval.

Christmas Has Become A Worldly Celebration, So We Should Avoid It As A ‘Set Apart’ People

Finally, some say that because the world celebrates Christmas – though it is becoming more and more politically correct to refer to it as “the holidays”- Christians should avoid it. But let me point out that’s the same argument made by cults that deny Jesus altogether, as well as cults such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses who deny his deity. I personally see the occasion of Christmas as an opportunity to proclaim Christ as “the reason for the season” among the nations, including those trapped in cults.

Ultimately, there’s no legitimate scriptural reason not to celebrate Christmas, while at the same time, no biblical mandate to celebrate it. So, in the end, whether or not to celebrate Christmas really comes down to a personal decision. Whatever you decide to do regarding Christmas, your (or my) views should not be used as a club to beat down or denigrate those with opposing views, nor should either view be used as a badge of honour inducing pride over celebrating or not celebrating. As in all things, we seek wisdom from God who gives it liberally to all who ask (James 1:5) and accept one another in Christian love and grace, regardless of our views.

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Overcoming Porn Addiction

It probably won’t come as a surprise to you when I say that the porn industry generates about $13 billion each year in the United States. It’s a heartbreaking reality that 9 out of 10 boys and 6 out of 10 girls have been exposed to pornography before the age of 18. In fact, the average age of first exposure is about 11 years old.

Studies show that terms relating to porn are by far the most commonly searched-for terms in the internet search engines. Every day, literally millions of people do searches related to the porn industry. The powerful imagery of internet pornography is highly addictive. Many men (and women) have been caught in the snare of internet porn and find themselves helplessly addicted to its visual stimulation. Most often pornography is viewed in isolation and so, the thinking goes, it’s not hurting anyone so why make it an issue?

Porn has an incredible way of appearing harmless. But researcher Patrick Fagan, Ph.D. completed a major study of pornography and called it a “quiet family killer.” His study found that fifty-six percent of divorces had one partner with an obsessive interest in porn.[1]

Why Pornography Should Be Avoided

Just a small bit of pornography can’t be all that bad, right? Wrong! Research has found that pornography is highly addictive. Scientists now know that when having sex or watching porn, dopamine is released into a region of the brain responsible for emotion and learning, giving the viewer a sense of sharp focus and a sense of craving: “I have got to have this thing; this is what I need right now.” It supplies a great sense of pleasure. The next time the viewer gets the “itch” for more sexual pleasure, small packets of dopamine are released in the brain telling the user: “Remember where you got your fix last time. Go there to get it.” Norepinephrine is also released, creating alertness and focus. It is the brain’s version of adrenaline. It tells the brain, “Something is about to happen, and we need to get ready for it.”

The body also releases endorphins, natural opiates that create a “high,” a wave of pleasure over the whole body. After sexual release serotonin levels also change, bringing a sense of calm and relaxation. Sex also triggers the release of oxytocin and vasopressin. These hormones help to lay down the long-term memories for the cells. They “bind” a person’s memories to the object that gave him or her the sexual pleasure.

This system is intricately designed to work this way while having sex with your spouse. God designed it for intimacy and pleasure as together you and your spouse can bond emotionally, physically, spiritually along with experiencing a high, an alertness of sexual pleasure, and the deep calm afterwards (norepinephrine, endorphins, and serotonin).

With each sexual embrace you are emotionally bonding to this person. Over time a craving for sex is transformed into a desire for one another (dopamine). That is one of the reason’s (among others) that a person should stay celibate until their wedding night. On the wedding night when the spouses engage in sexual intimacy for the very first time, there is a deep physical and emotional “bonding” that takes place with no guilt.  But porn short-circuits the system because it is impersonal, short term, and completely selfish.

The problem only grows the more porn is used, in that the more exposure to it, the more the need for it to create arousal. This results in uncontrollable lust mixed in with frustration, along with an inability to experience true sexual intimacy in marriage, and often intense feelings of guilt and despair. The images that pornography provides create unrealistic expectations that will leave you empty and unfulfilled with your spouse. So, choosing to avoid pornography altogether is choosing a healthier, more satisfying marriage and sex life.

It’s become a sad reality that our world is obsessed with sex and pornography. But it’s not just a problem with those in the world but also those who consider themselves not of this world.

A survey taken at a Promise Keepers rally revealed that over fifty percent of the men in attendance were involved with pornography within one week of attending the event.

And that was 20 years ago…

Did you know that fifty percent of Christian men and twenty percent of Christian women say they are addicted to pornography? I didn’t know that. And did you know that the most popular day of the week for viewing porn is Sunday? Personally, I love hanging out with family and friends at church in the mornings, and then watch football (followed by Dr. Who), either alone or with friends and family Sunday afternoons – Go Seahawks! So, I won’t lie that the last stat really surprised me.

There Is Hope In Jesus

Porn is a problem, as I’m sure you can already tell, but I don’t think all hope is lost. There are two primary aspects in the battle to overcome an addiction to internet porn: spiritual and practical.

Spiritually, addiction to pornography is a sin that God desires you to overcome and therefore will enable you to do so. The first step is to make sure you have genuinely placed your trust in Jesus Christ as your Saviour. If you are unsure, please visit our page here called Good News.

The truth is, that without salvation through Jesus, there is no possibility of a true and lasting victory over pornography: “Apart from me, you can do nothing” – John 15:5

If you are a believer in Christ yet struggling with an addiction to internet porn, there is amazing hope and there is great help for you through the power of the Holy Spirit, “According to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being.” – Ephesians 3:16 The cleansing of God’s forgiveness is extended to you, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” – 1 John 1:9

The renewing capacity of God’s Word is at your disposal, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” – Romans 12:1-2

As you begin your redemption journey remember to commit your mind and eyes to the Lord, “For all that is in the world – the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life – is not from the Father but is from the world.” – 1 John 2:16. Along the way ask God to strengthen you and help you to overcome pornography, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” – Philippians 4:13

As well, ask God to protect you from further exposure to porn, “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.” – 1 Corinthians 10:13, and to fill your mind with things that are pleasing to him, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” – Philippians 4:8

You may think that you are in an unwinnable battle, you may have tried before and failed, but you also need to know that you serve a Lord who hasn’t, nor will he, given up on you.

There Is Hope In Community

God has created us for community, and we fight best alongside others. Practically, to maintain sexual purity, we need a band of brothers & sisters with whom we can be open and honest with.

To be most successful, pray for and find two or three others who recognize that they themselves are real, hard-boiled messy sinners where the sinful, broken human condition is understood and the solution isn’t ‘trying harder’ but ‘deepening surrender’. They don’t need to be struggling with or have overcome porn addiction themselves, but they should be people who are honest about their own “stuff”.

Sexual sin runs deep – accountability should run deeper. If you find yourself in a situation where sexual sin has taken over or you’ve considered entertaining the idea, find someone to talk to. Be open and honest.

Also, become aware of the numerous tools at your disposal to help you combat an addiction to internet pornography. There are good programs available at Covenant Eyes or x3watch.com. Your temptation to view internet porn would be greatly reduced if you knew your youth pastor, parent, friend, pastor, or spouse would receive a detailed report about it.

Download PornAddiction.com & Nothing to Hide and start reading articles. Visit Doing Family Right’s Victory over Porn  page on their website. 

There are also quite a few good books on overcoming porn addiction: Every Man’s Battle: Winning the War on Sexual Purity One Victory at a Time by Stephen Arterburn and The Game Plan by Joe Dallas  are just two.

Don’t Do Nothing

I watched the movie ‘Christopher Robin’ with my family recently. It was a great movie filled with great quotable lines made by Winni the Poo. One line was, “Doing nothing often leads to the very best of something.” That line fit the context of the story perfectly, however in the case of porn addiction you must do the opposite. Don’t do nothing, because nothing always leads to something, and in the case of porn it is always the opposite of the very best for you.

Don’t despair! An addiction to internet porn is not an “unforgivable sin.” God can and will forgive you. As well, an addiction to internet porn is not an “unconquerable sin.” God can and will enable you to overcome it. Commit your mind and eyes to the Lord. Commit yourself to filling your mind with God’s Word, “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” – Psalm 119:11

Seek his help daily in prayer; ask him to fill your mind with his truth and block unwanted thoughts and desires. Take the practical steps listed above to keep yourself accountable and block access to internet porn. “Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us” – Ephesians 3:20

[1]https://www.allprodad.com/the-effects-of-porn-on-marriage/

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The Flood: True Story Or Just An Ancient Myth Among A Sea Of Ancient Myths?

Is the flood we are told about in the Genesis account a fact or just a story borrowed from Ancient myths? All over the world we find cultural legends and myths that closely resemble certain stories in Scripture such as Creation, the Fall, and the Flood.

I want to explore the story of the flood in this blog, however, before we dive in, (yes, I did just say that), we need to understand an important foundational point of reference to this discussion. It is simply this; if we accept Paul’s statement that we are all of “one blood” as he said while in Athens (Acts 17:26), then we should also accept the biblical account that all human heritage goes back to a singular region where all human population once lived after the global Flood of Noah’s day.

I say this because if that’s the case of real history, then we would expect to find common accounts told, such as Creation and the Flood, to be within the stories and traditions of a people group(s) that once lived together in one place. And then given years of cultural diversity, as mankind spread throughout the world, it should not be surprising that these stories would have naturally taken on their own cultural influences and nuances in the retelling.

Look no further than at the variety of Santa stories shared – all the similarities along with the differences – all over the globe: Santa Clause in Canada, Saint Nick in England, Dedt Moroz in Russia, Mikulás in Hungary (just to name a few). In some stories he’s jolly and approachable, in other stories he is to be feared and to stay away from. These stories have varied over a span of about 400-500 years, which is considerably a much shorter time period when compared to the ancient stories (i.e. the Great Flood), which would have been told and retold for a thousand or more years. When understood this way, it makes sense that there should be similarities as well as differences in the ancient telling’s.

The Gilgamesh Epic

In the mid-1800s several excavations were made in present day Iraq. The archeologists uncovered a whole library of tablets from earlier Mesopotamian times, discovered buried in cities of the Ancient Near East, including Nineveh and Nippur. These tablets listed kings, business archives, administrative documents, and a number of versions of the flood narrative. Each version had a different language and most were only partially intact. However, there was one that was the most complete with twelve tablets – the Babylonian collection of The Gilgamesh Epic. [1]

On the eleventh tablet of this epic was a description about a great Flood, with much of its detail showing similarities with the biblical account. This flood story invited many skeptics to claim that this was proof that the biblical account was a derivation of ancient mythology, just another story among countless stories found in the Ancient Middle East. The land was prone to flooding after-all, and the inhabitants would have looked for explanations to explain the ‘why’s’ of these natural disasters. Initially shared around campfires, these stories eventually made their way to tablets such as the one found. Simple, case closed… But not so fast.

Fallible Versus the Infallible

Only two conclusions can come from a study evaluating if the Bible and the stories found in its pages are truly a derivation from ancient mythology. 1) If this is true, biblical claims of God’s inspiration are untrue, and the Bible then can’t be trusted. 2) The Bible truly is the Word of God, and any other claim of authorship or external influence is false.

What it boils down to is this… If the significance of finding these documents in Nineveh and Nippur caused a skeptic to doubt the authority and validity of Scripture, the issue is simply an interpretation problem. It comes down to being a case of the fallible versus the infallible. In other words, we should always remember that the Bible is the inerrant and infallible Word of God, which follows that it should be allowed to interpret itself and the fallible evidence rather than permitting the fallible evidence to interpret the Scripture given to us from the infallible Word of God.

It’s In The Details

The Gilgamesh story introduces us to a guy named Gilgamesh, who is out and about looking for another guy who goes by the name Utnapishtim, (he’s the Babylonian equivalent of Noah). Apparently, Utnapishtim is able to give him the secret of immortality, which he’s motivated to get a hold of because he’s grief stricken after losing his best pal Enkidu.

During their conversation, Utnapishtim tells him about something else he feels is more important to know, at least for the moment. Evidently, the gods want to flood the world and get rid of mankind because they can’t sleep. The reason? Their human neighbours are making too much noise. They’re causing all kinds of racket, what with all their squabbles, and parties and also because of their squabbles for not being invited to parties… or something like that.

Earlier, Ea, the god of wisdom, had come and warned Utnapishtim in a dream to convert his house to a boat, and to then take in the seed of all living creatures, but then to not say anything about the other gods’ plans. He was instead to throw another god named Enlil under the bus (or camel train at that time) by telling the people he was building a boat to escape the wrath of that specific god Enlil.

So, Utnapishtim builds his boat in seven days and takes his family, and Gilgamesh, and the creatures, and all the craftsmen into his houseboat. The great flood came, and even the gods who planned it all were terrified of it and fled. For six days and nights, the flood overwhelmed the world and on the seventh day grew calm. The boat rested on a mountain called Nisir, and there Utnapishtim sent out a dove, then a swallow, and then a raven. When the raven didn’t return, he made a sacrifice, and the gods reappeared and gathered like flies over it.

Interesting story, especially with some of the parallels to the Genesis account. However, comparing the two accounts of the flood there are a few details that definitely stand out, especially given that the ancient stories are a little fuzzy when it comes to details.

The rule of thumb when comparing conflicting accounts of the same event is; the more detail there is in the sharing of an account, the more it can be held up as the more accurate version of said account. The reality is that the more explainable, consistent and provable the details are being shared, the more one can believe, especially when facts can be verified and/or recognized for their value to the specific event. Let’s look at how the stories stack up

Detail: Boat

One of the first details you might notice is that scripture specifically says that Noah took two of every kind of land-dwelling animal and seven of some other animals onto the Ark.

You shall take with you of every clean animal by sevens, a male and his female; and of animals that are not clean two, a male and his female; also, of the birds of the sky, by sevens, male and female, to keep offspring alive on the face of all the earth.” – Genesis 7:2-3

The biblical dimensions of the Ark are detailed and consistent with a vessel that could float in rough waters and could house the animals described along with the provisions of the food required. Especially considering the argument for young (small) animals on the Ark along with hibernations which would require a lot less food than if full grown animals were on the boat. Let alone the argument for origin of family species (i.e. all dogs are descended from a wolf or wolf type pair representing all the canine species we know of today), which meant that a limited number of each species were on the ark, allowing for the size ratio to be consistent.

The dimensions of the boat in The Gilgamesh Epic amount to more of a cube shaped vessel with the beam equaling the length. Although we know it had seven stories (decks), it is impossible to determine the full size of the vessel. Logistically, this (house) boat could not float in a stable manner in rough seas and would not be structurally reliable.

The Genesis account is clear about the size of the Ark needed for such a cargo. We can safely calculate the size of a ship needed to the number of animals, supplies & people and come to a very reliable and realistic expectation of a ‘size to cargo ratio’. In other words, the number of animals and the size of the ark specified in the biblical account is realistic and thus reliable as a stand-alone component to the story.

The Gilgamesh Epic on the other hand, would be an unreliable account in a court of law because it leaves us with no information about how many animals were likely on board the boathouse or whether all of the necessary kinds would have been represented for repopulation (along with the obvious problems that come with the structure itself).

Detail: Water

The next detail explained in the Genesis account is that the Flood began with all the fountains of the great deep broke open, covering the whole earth to the extent of the highest mountains, along with telling us that it killed every man and land dwelling, air breathing animal of the earth (Genesis 7:11-24).

The biblical detail shows that the whole earth was covered by water coming from both above and below and that it rained continuously for 40 days and nights with the waters continuing to rise until the 150th day. Science safely concurs with the effects of such a rain, along with fact that there are, even today, underground lakes and oceans that, if burst out of the earth, would have the potential of creating such a flood. Whether the skeptic chooses to believe it’s ‘probable’ or not, it certainly can’t be denied that it’s ‘possible’ based on the details provided.

The Gilgamesh Epic, while stating the devastation of the flood on humanity, doesn’t specifically detail the full geographical extent and depth of the Flood. Also, it is unreasonable to expect so much water coverage in just six days of rain.

Detail: Birds

The Genesis account is consistently reliable on the explanation of the birds that were released. For one thing, it’s logical to send out a raven before a dove, given that ravens are scavengers while doves feed only on plants. The intervals of release of the dove are consistent with the expectation of having a drained land for vegetation and occupants, and this correlates with the dove returning with a freshly picked olive leaf and then the dove not returning at all.

By contrast, The Gilgamesh Epic mentions a dove, then a swallow, and finally a raven. There are no intervals mentioned to assess the appropriate time length for flights, and sending a raven last is questionable in that ravens may have been able to survive as scavengers.

Detail: Morality

The God of the Bible sent the Flood on an already cursed world because of man’s wicked heart that only desired evil. God’s judgment in the light of sin is righteous, moral and just.

In contrast In the Gilgamesh Epic, the gods are petty, impatient and impulsive. Simply because they don’t like their noisy human neighbours, they decide to destroy them. The gods have no justifiable moral reason to do so. Further to that, the Babylonian gods go as far as to lie and tell Utnapishtim to deceive his fellow humans about the coming wrath.

The Gilgamesh Epic promotes polytheistic mythology, whereas the Bible presents monotheistic theology. The many gods in The Gilgamesh Epic differ in ideas and motivations, and they seek to thwart each other. The God of the Bible is holy, pure, unchanging, and cannot lie. These are just a few of the character differences between the biblical God and the description of the gods in the Babylonian myth.

Details, details, details, so important to a story…

There are many more details that can be discovered if we spent more time researching, but even based solely on comparison between the perfect Word of God and the imperfect pagan myths, it is absurd to think the descriptions in the Babylonian texts could be the source of the Genesis account in the inspired Word of God.

Ultimately, even the honest skeptic can’t help but see that the Genesis Flood account gives enough credible information to allow for historical and geological confirmation, while The Gilgamesh Epic provides little that can be confirmed, and what is provided does not make sense logically or scientifically.

The Similarities Make Sense

The similarities among Ancient Near Eastern mythologies, the Gilgamesh Epic and the Bible should not cause us to question the biblical account, because they actually make sense from a biblical worldview. There really should be no surprise to see people groups all over the world with their own accounts of the Creation, the Fall, the Flood, and even the Tower of Babel. The accounts tell us people once had the same record or were eyewitnesses of common events handed down from a generation that was once congregated in the same place at the same time for a period of time.

The Gilgamesh Epic tells a sad tale of a man (who was supposedly part god) looking desperately for everlasting life. This was a man who knew of great men of old who lived long lives and supposedly became gods, and he wanted to attain this status himself. He had a desperate desire to avoid death. A Christian can hear stories like this and consider them in light of biblical truth.

It’s in the Bible that we see the devastation of sin in the judgment of death and mankind’s continual need for a Saviour. So, when we read the account of the true story of a worldwide Flood that covered the entire earth in Genesis, we can recognize both God’s faithfulness in judgment and in salvation by protecting a line of humanity for the promised Messiah.

In the light of Scripture, we see confirmation in mythology around the world that the Bible is indeed God’s Word and the only reliable source of truth. In the message of God’s Word, we see him stepping into this world and taking upon himself the wrath we deserve. Only through the consistent word of the Bible can we know that salvation is only received through faith in Jesus Christ alone.

  1. [1]The Epic of Gilgamesh, translated by Andrew George (New York: Penguin Books, 1960).
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Can A Christian Lose Their Salvation?

“Can a Christian lose their salvation?” (or similar), is a question I frequently hear from the lips of new or immature Christians who have often been battling an area of sin, are guilt ridden and are scared that God will or has already kicked them out of the ‘family’ because he won’t stand for their weakness’ any further. The image is one of a shouting boss or angry dad who, “Won’t put up with your incompetence any longer!”

However, the answer to their question and the balm to their fears biblically is a resounding, clear, emphatic, joyful, glorious “No.” A born-again person cannot become dead, cannot be unborn again. John MacArthur once said, “If you could lose your salvation you would.” With respect to John MacArthur, I’d go a step further and say that if I could lose my salvation I already would have.

When people come to know Christ as their Saviour, they are brought into a relationship with God that guarantees their eternal security. Jude said, “To Him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy.” – Jude 24. Jude knows that his half-brother Jesus is a God who is All-Powerful, and it’s his power that is able to keep the believer from falling, not yours or mine. It is up to him, not us, to present us before his glorious presence.

Jesus proclaimed, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand” – John 10:28-29b

In other words, both Jesus and the Father have us firmly grasped in their hands. Think about it, they are so amazingly strong, who could possibly separate us from their holds? That’s a firm grip I’m thinking.

Paul says in Ephesians 4:30 that believers are “sealed for the day of redemption.” If believers did not have eternal security, the sealing could not actually be to the day of redemption, but only to the day of sinning, apostasy, or disbelief. And then John 3:15-16 tells us that whoever believes in Jesus Christ will “have eternal life.” Logically then, if a person were to be promised eternal life, but then have it taken away, it was never “eternal” to begin with. That means then that if eternal security isn’t true, the promises of eternal life in the Bible would be lies.

Ah… But What About Hebrews 6?

There are many people who have taught (and others sadly still teach today) that Hebrews 6:4-6 clearly shows that a Christian can lose his or her salvation. I admit, that at a cursory reading, it does seem that this interpretation is correct. But, as it is with many scriptures, we need to be careful about not getting into the‘first glance then interpret habit’. So, let’s slow down and take a close look at this passage and see what it really is saying.

“For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and shave shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.” – Hebrews 6:4-6

This passage begs the question, “How can one be ‘enlightened’ and fall away?” It does seem to be speaking of someone losing his or her salvation.

Or does it?…

It’s important to know that this section of Hebrews is talking about apostates and heretics who may have, to some degree, embraced the gospel presented to them, but have now abandoned it. However, if we want to fully understand what is being said here we need to also know context. For instance, it’s important to know how the believers who originally read this message would have understood the phrase, “those who have once been enlightened”. Today, we might think it means that they were enlightened about the truth, or that they were regenerated. But before we add our cultural or 21st century interpretation to this passage we need to first ask what the intent of the original author was, and how would his readers have understood it?

Glad you asked…

What this passage is speaking about is of certain individuals who were involved, perhaps heavily involved, in a church community. They would have heard the gospel, and would have seen the Spirit working in the lives of the Believers. They most likely would have even received some of the blessings of being part of a covenant community, even probably publicly confessing Jesus and then getting themselves dunked ‘baptized’. By the way, it’s important to note in light of this passage, that in many instances, the early Christian writers spoke to conversion and baptism as “enlightenment”.

Back to the context. The context leads us to understand that those same people just described, never had a saving knowledge of Jesus. They only “tasted” or “sampled” him. They were never truly converted to him by faith.

Think about it this way. There is a big difference between marrying someone and just going out on a few dates with them. Anyone can learn things about Jesus, even come to admire him, and even enjoy being part of a community that celebrates him, yet still have no real lasting commitment to him.

Another example is Costco. Yes, I said Costco and yes, I mean the big giant corporation. Anyways, Deb & I are card carrying members and will go to buy and experience the perceived savings and the occasional deals that the blessed membership brings to our lives.

On occasion, one or both of our boys will come along, but for very different reasons. They are “enlightened” by, and enjoy many of the same goodies that Deb & I bring home, but they aren’t members and so can’t experience the same benefits of being a member that the totalitarian corporation can bring them. They do not have access to the inner sanctum on their own. They simply come with us to “taste” the samples that are given out. They are in Costco, but not of Costco.

We see this today. There are people who attend church for years, involve themselves in a lot of good things, even have a perfect attendance record, but aren’t saved. They’ve been “enlightened” by seeing God at work, but have only just “tasted” or “sampled” what was going on, never really being a part of it. Never buying the membership card as it were.

To paraphrase Scripture, they were “in the church, but not of the Church.” In the end I think we can all understand that to be a baptized member of a church, and to be “enlightened” by the life seen in the Church and seeing God at work, doesn’t mean the same thing. In other words, “enlightened” does not necessarily mean “saved.”

But Doesn’t ‘Fallen Away” mean That They Were Saved At Some Point?

That still leaves an important question unanswered. If the ‘those’ is someone who has ‘tasted’ of the Church, has seen what’s been going on and seen God at work, has been ‘in the church, but not of the Church,’ what exactly have they ‘fallen away’ from that they can’t be ‘restore[ed] again to through repentance’? Doesn’t that imply that they were originally brought to a place of repentance? Doesn’t ‘fallen away’ mean that they were at a place to have fallen away from? In other words, weren’t they saved at some point?

John Calvin states that the unsaved person in this situation holds onto the “shadow” instead of the “substance.” This, Calvin proposes, is what is called a “temporary faith.”

Louis Berkhof in his Systematic Theology says that temporary faith is most likely “grounded in the emotional life and seeks personal enjoyment rather than the glory of God.” That’s why it is not difficult to understand why this kind of false faith is quickly lost when God or the church stops being be fun, or when it simply loses its appeal. But for those of us who have taken a hold of the substance – Jesus Christ – our salvation, from beginning to end, is undergirded by God. Understanding this helps us I think understand the parable of the seed in Matthew’s Gospel.

Three Indicators That You’re Truly Saved

For those of you who still are uncertain about whether you are saved or not, the following is what I share with those people who come to me with heart felt questions about their security in Christ. I discovered over the years that The Apostle John was gracious enough to give us three indicators that help us to know that our salvation is owned in our hearts.

1) We believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God and so love him with our whole heart.

You should have confidence in your salvation if you believe in Jesus Christ the Son of God, 1 John 5:11-13. John doesn’t want people to doubt. God wants you to have assurance, to know that you have eternal life. And this is the first sign that you believe in Jesus.

You believe he is the Christ – the Messiah, 1 John 2:22.

You believe he is the Son of God, 1 John 5:10.

You believe that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, 1 John 4:2.

If you get your theology wrong about Jesus you’ll not have eternal life. But one of the signs that should give you confidence before God is that you do believe in his only Son Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour and that you believe that he is who he claims to be… God come in the flesh. As we grasp this great truth the great truth begins to grasp our heart and we begin to love God with our whole selves. As a result, we see the other two indicators begin to take root in our faith journey.

2) We Aim to Live Righteously

You should also have confidence if you live a righteous life; 1 John 3:6-9; 3:24. Those who practice wickedness, who plunge headlong into sin, who not only stumble, but habitually walk in wickedness – should not be confident. This is no different than what Paul tells us in Romans 6 that we are no longer slaves to sin but slaves to righteousness. We see this also in Galatians 5 that those who walk in the flesh will not inherit the kingdom.

This is no different than what Jesus tells us in John 15 that a good tree cannot bear bad fruit and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. So, if you live a life where your radar is continually being pulled back to a morally righteous life (even though you will stumble at times), you should have confidence. And in case this standard make you despair, keep in mind that part of living a righteous life is refusing to claim that you live without sin and coming to Christ for cleansing when you do sin, 1 John 1:9-10.

3) We love other Christians

You should also have confidence if you love other Christians, 1 John 3:14. Even the grumpy and mean ones or the ones who don’t seem to love back. None of that matters. In other words, if you hate like Cain you don’t have life, but if your heart and your wallet are open to your brothers and sisters no matter how they respond (or not respond), then true relationship with Jesus is a marker in you. One necessary sign of true spiritual life is that we love one another.

These are John’s three signposts to assure us that we are on the road that leads to eternal life. Keep in mind, these are not three things we do to earn salvation, but three indicators that God has indeed saved us. We believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. We aspire to live a righteous life. We are generous in love toward other Christians.

Or we can put it this way: we know we have eternal life if we love Jesus, love his commands, and love his people; 1 John 2:4, 6; 4:20; 5:2. None of the three are optional. All must be present and growing in the Christian, and all three are meant to be signs for our assurance.

John belabours the same points again and again. Do you love God? Do you love his commands? Do you love his people? If you don’t, it’s a sign you have death. If you are seeing these become growing habits and desires, it’s sign that you have life. And that means confidence instead of condemnation.

Be Encouraged

On those day where you may still feel less than encouraged, you may find your heart blessed by these words of Charles Spurgeon taken from a sermon he preached Sunday Morning, March 23, 1856, At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

“If Christians can fall away, and cease to be Christians, they cannot be renewed again to repentance. “But,” says one, “You say they cannot fall away.” What is the use of putting this “if” in, like a bugbear to frighten children, or like a ghost that can have no existence? My learned friend, “Who art thou that replies against God?” If God has put it in, he has put it in for wise reasons and for excellent purposes. Let me show you why. First, O Christian, it is put in to keep thee from falling away. God preserves his children from falling away; but he keeps them by the use of means; and one of these is, the terrors of the law, showing them what would happen if they were to fall away. There is a deep precipice: what is the best way to keep any one from going down there? Why, to tell him that if he did he would inevitably be dashed to pieces. In some old castle there is a deep cellar, where there is a vast amount of fixed air and gas, which would kill anybody who went down. What does the guide say? “If you go down you will never come up alive.” Who thinks of going down? The very fact of the guide telling us what the consequences would be, keeps us from it. Our friend puts away from us a cup of arsenic; he does not want us to drink it, but he says, “If you drink it, it will kill you.” Does he suppose for a moment that we should drink it? No; he tells us the consequences, and he is sure we will not do it. So, God says, “My child, if you fall over this precipice you will be dashed to pieces.” What does the child do? He says, “Father, keep me; hold thou me up, and I shall be safe.” It leads the believer to greater dependence on God, to a holy fear and caution, because he knows that if he were to fall away he could not be renewed, and he stands far away from that great gulf, because he knows that if he were to fall into it there would be no salvation for him.”

After all is said, I still believe that the most powerful argument for eternal security in our salvation is found in Paul’s letter to the Romans, which speaks to the fact that our security is based on God’s love for the ones he has redeemed.

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 8:38-39

Insert image here (Paul’s mike drop…)

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Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?

The other day as I was getting a haircut, my stylist (I know – what hair do I have to style?), found out I was a pastor and so asked me a great question based off of an earlier conversation about the news coming out of the Middle East. “Why do Muslim’s and Christian’s fight each other? Don’t you really worship the same God anyways? Why not just focus on the stuff you are the same like the love stuff and be kind to each other stuff?”

She probably didn’t expect me to answer the way I did. Most people just say “You’re right, why don’t we?” I think most people would answer that way because they don’t know what to say or because they’d agree with her premise. Before you accuse me of promoting hatred and warfare, I did agree with her about the peace part. After all, we are to love God and our neighbour as ourselves, and the neighbour thing includes my muslim neighbours whether they be next door here in Halifax or across the ocean.

What I didn’t agree with her about was the idea that we worship the same God. So I seized on her openness of the moment to share the beauty and uniqueness of Jesus and his teachings. She engaged in the conversation and was genuinely surprised about the differences – apparently no one had told her what I was telling her, along with the obvious fact that she hadn’t explored the idea herself.

I wasn’t surprised, and in fact I find this to be a common way of thinking. What I do find surprising however, is that there are some within the Christian camp who hold a similar belief, in that there isn’t much difference between the three Abrahamic faiths; Christianity, Islam and Judaism. In fact, there are a large number who’d say that we actually worship the same God.

Back in December of 2015, Dr. Larycia Hawkins, a professor with Wheaton College (An evangelical institution), put on a hijab and stated on Facebook, “I stand in religious solidarity with Muslims because they, like me, a Christian, are people of the book. And as Pope Francis stated last week, we worship the same God.”

Five days after that posting, Wheaton College gave Dr. Hawkins a ‘time out’ saying that they wanted to give her “more time to explore (the) theological implications of her recent public statements.” Giving a grown woman, a Doctor none the less, a time out wasn’t received well, based on the firestorm of controversy it ignited.

The Chicago Tribune, described Wheaton’s actions as “bigotry… disguised as theology.” This assessment was partially based on the input of Yale Professor Miroslav Volf, a theologian who said, “There isn’t any theological justification for Hawkins’s forced administrative leave. Her suspension is not about theology and orthodoxy. It is about enmity toward Muslims.” That sounds a bit harsh, but is he right?

WHAT IF ANY, ARE THE SIMILARITIES?  

The founder of Islam, Muhammad, saw himself as the last in a line of prophets that reached back through Jesus to Moses, beyond him to Abraham and as far back as Noah. According to the Quran, God (known as Allah) revealed to Muhammad:

“The Book with the truth [the Quran], confirming what was before it, and [before He sent down the Quran] He sent down the Torah of Moses and the Gospel of Jesus… as a guidance for the people.” 

The Muslim and Christian views of God certainly do have some similarities. For example, Christians believe in one eternal God who created the universe, and Muslims apply these attributes to Allah. Both view God as all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present. Jesus is mentioned 25 times in the Qur’an. And then there’s the fact that Christianity and Islam having similar teachings on morals and ethics.

The obvious conclusion to some then is that Muslims worship the same God as Christians, it’s just that the two mega faiths are simply having some familial misunderstandings about what he’s like and what he’s done – yet still the same God. After all, both Christians and Muslims recognize that their books speak about the same God who created Adam and Eve, who rescued Noah from the flood, who promised Abraham a vast progeny, who helped Moses escape Egypt, who made the Virgin Mary great with child, who sent Jesus into the world, who helped the disciples overcome, and who is still sovereign today. Is that not the God of the Bible being described in the Quran? The Quran even asserts that the Torah and the Gospel are inspired scripture and that Jews and Christians are people of the Book.

And then there’s the fact, the Quran tells Muslims to say to them (Christians and Jews), “Our God and your God is One, and unto Him we surrender” (29.46).

That sounds very benign… and inclusive to me. Listen, if the Quran asserts that Muslims worship the same God as Jews and Christians, doesn’t that settle the matter?

Fair question deserving a fair answer. My observation however, is that those assertions do not settle the matter even remotely. That’s because Muslims and Christians do not worship the same God. Here is why I make that claim. It’s because making a claim that it is the same God being truly and honestly worshiped equally by both Muslims and Christians quite simply subverts Christian orthodoxy in favour of Islamic claims.

ARE THE DIFFERENCES REALLY DIFFERENT ENOUGH?

Christians believe Jesus is God, but the Quran is so opposed to this creed that it condemns Jesus worshipers to Hell (5.72). In fact, any belief in the deity of Jesus is considered shirk (“polytheism”) to Muslims. Further to this, Islam denies the death of Christ on the cross (4:157–158). So, right at the start, the most crucial doctrine of the Christian faith is rejected in Islam. This fact alone should be enough to settle the matter.

But even if that wasn’t enough, there is the doctrine of the Trinity to consider. In the Bible, God has revealed himself as one God in three Persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. So from a right understanding of Christian scripture, we see that while each Person of the Trinity is fully God, God is not three gods, but three in one.

God’s Son came in the form of man, a truth called the incarnation, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Sonfrom the Father, full of grace and truth.” – John 1:14(Also look up, Luke 1:30-35; Colossians 2:9; 1 John 4:1-3).

Jesus conquered the penalty and power of sin by dying on the cross, and then after rising from the dead, went back to heaven to be with his Father and sent the Holy Spirit to believers.

 “’But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.’ And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, ‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven’.” – Acts 1:8-11.

Islam, on the other hand, roundly condemns worship of the Trinity (5.73), establishing, in contrast, its own core principle: Tawhid, the absolute oneness of God. Tawhid specifically denies the Trinity, so much so that according to Islam, worshiping the Christian God is not just wrong; it sends you to Hell.

ARE WE BEING HYPOCRITICAL WHEN IT COMES TO THE JEWISH FAITH?

Allow me to answer a question that many might be asking at this point. “How can you Christians accuse Muslims of worshiping a different God without also indicting the Jews of doing the same thing, isn’t that hypocritical & inconsistent?”

That is a fair question, however the response should be obvious to those who have studied the three Abrahamic faiths: The Trinity is an elaboration of Jewish theology, not a rejection. By contrast, Tawhid is a categorical rejection of the Trinity, Jesus’ deity, and the Fatherhood of God, doctrines that are grounded in the pages of the New Testament and firmly established centuries before the advent of Islam. Most of the earliest Christians were Jews, incorporating their encounter with Jesus into their Jewish theology. Nothing of the sort is true of Muhammad, who was neither a Jew nor a Christian. Islam did not elaborate on the Trinity but rejected and replaced it.

For the Christian though, no Trinity means no incarnation of God’s Son in the Person of Jesus Christ. Without Jesus Christ, there would be no salvation from sin, no matter you be religiously Christian, Jewish or Muslim. Without salvation, sin condemns all to an eternal hell. And for Christians, the deity of Christ is non-negotiable, because without his deity, Jesus’ death on the cross would not have been sufficient to be the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the entire world, “He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” – 1 John 2:2

So, do Christians and Muslims worship the same God? A better question is, “Do Christians and Muslims both have a correct understanding of who God is?” To this question, the answer is definitely a big fat NO! And that is this, because of the crucial differences between the Christian and Muslim concepts of God, the two faiths cannot both be true. The biblical God alone addresses and solves the problem of sin by giving his Son, the God man Jesus Christ.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” – John 3:16-18

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Hasn’t Science Proven There is No God?

“How often have we turned on the television and heard the host say, “Tonight we will be talking about faith versus science. Or first guest is a former University of Oxford professor, evolutionary biologist, and bestselling author. He believes that science, not faith, holds the answers to all questions. On the other side of the aisle we have Joe Smith, who will speak for the legitimacy of faith and Christianity. Joe home schools his kids, thinks Oprah is the Antichrist, and lives in a swamp.”

The opening scene depicted in Mark Clark’s book, The Problem of God: Answering a Skeptic’s Challenge to Christianity, comically captures the popular idea that science and religion are incompatible ideologies. But as humorous as we might find it, there’s a sobering truth to what he says. There are many who truly believe that science is the only answer in this serious business of discovering humanity’s origins and man’s purpose, whereas religion (christianity in particular) is simply an embarrassing part of an antiquated past, best left behind.

Are Religion & Science Incompatible Ideologies?

The world’s chief apostle for atheism, Richard Dawkins, wrote in his 2006 book; “The God Delusion”, that God and belief in God are “delusions.” Belief in God, says Dawkins, subverts science and knowledge, breeds ignorance, foments bigotry, and abuses children. All this happens for the simple reason that God (according to Dawkins) is a delusion. Is he right? 

Contrary to the popular narrative of our time that posits faith, and Christianity specifically, against science, the reality is the church has never been its enemy, and any disagreements between the two, which have of course existed at times, have been gravely exaggerated.

As an example, stories are told about Galileo, Copernicus, and Giordano Bruno being tortured for holding “heliocentric” views of the universe. Thrilling dramas, but untrue, what we call historical revisionism.

The church did persecute Galileo for a season, demanding he recant some of his heliocentric views, but he was never charged with heresy and placed in a dungeon, or tortured, as has become popular mythology among skeptics.

He was sentenced to house arrest and then released into the custody of the archbishop of Siena, who housed him for five months in his palace because of other theological issues centred around the trinity. Galileo then returned to his villa in Florence, continuing his scientific work and even publishing, before dying of natural causes in 1642.

Another modern example of this historical revisionism by skeptics is the story of the medieval church believing that the Bible taught a flat earth, and then reacting in outrage when science came along and proved that the Bible was wrong.

This is simply not true. From the time of the ancient Greeks, people knew the earth was round. Job and Isaiah both speak of the earth being a sphere and Isaiah specifically speaks to the universe expanding. And this well before the Hubel telescope.

Any high school graduate will say that we learned that Pythagoras (c. 570 – 500 B.C.) was the first person to assert that the earth is round.However, the biblical passages are older than him. Isaiah is generally acknowledged to have been written in the 700s B.C. and Job is thought to have been written around 2000 B.C.

The secular astronomers before the time of Pythagoras must have thought the scriptures were wrong about its teaching of a round earth, yet the bible was exactly right. It was the secular science of the day that needed to be corrected.

So, the popular picture of Christians being scared of science and deep thinking has simply never been true. In fact, the University itself is a twelfth-century Christian invention. Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Dartmouth, and Brown all began as Christian institutions.

Facts are that detailed scientific and literary analysis has not only been an emphasis of Christianity since its inception, but Christianity had a part in their birth.

What about Faith & Logic?

A close cousin to the myth that religion & science aren’t compatible is the myth that faith & logic don’t mix.

Faith is something religious people have versus the rest of humanity, say atheists or agnostics, who believe in facts and logic. However, everyone, even the most convinced atheist, has a faith position. Everyone believes in something and makes assumptions about reality that can’t be proven even through science.

That’s because everything we believe is filtered through a grid, or worldview, that has been adopted over time (constructed from a myriad of variables: where and when we were born, our family, our education, media, etc.).

We are frequently unaware of these presuppositions, but we must see that all of them are, to a certain degree, faith-based conclusions rather than beliefs adopted through empirical proof.

For instance, I recently read a story about a nurse who was a follower of Jesus. The doctors with whom she worked were adamant that the hospital was a purely secular place – in other words, there was no room for “faith” to play a role in caring for patients. One night the staff was discussing a patient who was on life support.

In debating whether to take him off or not, one doctor said to another, “Well, at least we know if we do that he won’t be suffering anymore.”

Everyone in the group nodded in agreement. But the nurse wondered to herself, how do you know this? That belief (the idea that the person would not be suffering anymore once he was dead) in and of itself is a metaphysical statement about what the afterlife is like.

The group of doctors were speaking out of a faith position for which they had no proof. How did they know that this person wouldn’t be suffering more than he was now? They believed this wholeheartedly, but based on what evidence? It is a faith position. Everyone has one.

Spock from Star Trek’s famous line was always, “Logic Dictates” as the answer for all arguments and solutions to issues. Spock used logical apologetics to reach his answers. I believe we can learn from Spock.

Within the philosophical circles and academia there are a few logical systems of arguments that are commonly used to come to some kind of reasoning regarding matters of faith.

They are not perfect but are helpful as a starting point for someone who may be sincerely seeking answers but yet may not be at the place where they accept the authority of the word of God quite yet.

There are a few different logical arguments but I’m only going to share three for our purposes this morning.

The first one, the teleological argument, states that since the universe displays such an amazing design, there must have been a divine designer. Just as we would expect that there is a designer behind an intricate design of a watch so there must be a designer behind the more intricate design of the universe.

A second logical argument, the cosmological argument, states that every effect must have a cause. This universe and everything in it is an effect. There must be something that caused everything to come into existence. Ultimately, there must be something “un-caused” in order to initially cause everything else to come into existence.

The theory of the ‘Big Bang’ is currently the leading explanation about how the universe began. At its simplest, it says the universe as we know it started with a small singularity, then inflated over the next 13.8 billion years to become the cosmos that we know today. However, the question remains… what or who caused the bang? God as the un-caused is still the best explanation.

A third argument is known as the moral argument.Every culture throughout history has had some form of law. Everyone has a sense of right and wrong. Murder, lying, stealing, and immorality are almost universally rejected.

Where did this sense of right and wrong come from? Dawkins claims that sense of right or wrong come from self… we are the arbitrators of what is deemed good or bad.

If that’s the case then what’s to stop the Nazi’s from claiming that their philosophy which led to the extermination of millions of Jews and others is good? What makes my judgment call of good or bad better or superior to your judgment calls?

Is Logic Important?

Logic becomes important when examining claims because it helps us dictate why some claims should be excluded and others embraced. And one of the core laws of logic is the law of non-contradiction, which says something cannot be both “A” and “non-A” at the same time and in the same sense.

For example, pepper can’t be pepper and salt. If something is black, it’s not white. The only exception to this rule is when a man sees a pink dress and calls it what it is… pink. But then a woman comes along and calls it salmon, or rose, or faded red… or something else as ridiculous. Listen, in that case I stand by pink AND whatever else you call it.

That being said, used properly, logic is a potent weapon against pluralism because it clearly demonstrates that contrary truth claims cannot both be true. This understanding topples the whole “It might be true for you but not for me” mindset.

The conclusion is that faith & logic are compatible and that you can use reason and logic in matters of religion.

What Does the Bible Say About God?

After saying all this, part of the irony of attempting to prove God exists to a non-believer is that it can never be proven, but to a believer, proof of God can be seen just about everywhere.

Of course, if you need to see it to believe it, do you really have faith? The Bible says that we must accept by faith the fact that God exists: “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him” – Hebrews 11:6

If God so desired, he could simply appear and prove to the whole world that he exists. But if he did that, there would be no need for faith. That does not mean, however, that there is no evidence of God’s existence.

The Bible states, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.” – Psalm 19:1-4

Looking at the stars, understanding the vastness of the universe, observing the wonders of nature, seeing the beauty of a sunset – all of these things point to a Creator God. If these were not enough, there is also evidence of God in our own hearts. Ecclesiastes 3:11 tells us, “…He has also set eternity in the hearts of men.”

Deep within us is the recognition that there is something beyond this life and someone beyond this world. We can deny this knowledge intellectually, but God’s presence in us and all around us is still obvious.

Since the vast majority of people throughout history, in all cultures, in all civilizations, and on all continents believe in the existence of some kind of God, there must be something (or someone) causing this belief.

In Psalm 139:4, David said that we were “fearfully and wonderfully made”.As modern science discovers more about the universe, we find more evidence of a designer creator. Consider the mystery of a sperm and an egg joining together to produce life.

And the fact that no two people in the world are exactly alike. No two fingerprints are alike. The amazing complexity and replication of DNA. Every one of the 7.5 trillion cells in your body contains the genetic material to make another you, and yet your DNA is unique to you! You are different from every other person who has ever lived.

We also see God through the evidence of morality, cosmology, biology, and astronomy. The evidences are there to overwhelming introduce us to God. And not just a winder of the clock but a God who cares intimately about each of us. All of these things scream that there is a God!

Does God’s Existence Matter?

The Bible’s presentation of God shows why his existence matters. God’s holy nature is revealed in contrast to human (sinful) nature, and the Bible gives mankind a standard of right and wrong. Without an arbiter, there is no final authority to weigh the values we establish for ourselves.

Who is to say one thing is wrong and another right? Why is it incumbent upon us to help those in need? By what authority can we object to illiteracy? If there is no God, and life on earth is simply “survival of the fittest,” then why should anyone work to feed the hungry? Upon what standard do we lay the foundation of our morality?

Dawkins said that God is a delusion. However, God is not the delusion; atheism is. The apostle Paul declares that the human race in general is lost in sin and self-delusion (2 Timothy4:3-4). A sober assessment of human beings recognizes that we lie, cheat, steal, lust, complain, envy, hate, and forget and that we are careless, ruthless, disrespectful, resentful, and loveless. We are all these things naturally from birth. We are so obviously sinful that it is silly to call human beings “good.” The denial of God is the true delusion that extends to the atheist’s view of humanity as “good,” all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.

“As it is written: ‘None is righteous, not even one; There is none who understands; there is none who seeks for God All have turned aside, together they have become useless there is none who does good. There is not even one’.” – Romans 3:10-12

Think about it. Nobody teaches children to lie; they do it naturally. Nobody teaches teenage boys to lust; they do it naturally. Nobody teaches the employee to resent his boss or spread malicious gossip about the co-worker with whom he is competing with for a promotion; he does these things naturally. Nobody teaches the wife to unjustly criticize her husband or the husband to neglect his wife; both do these things naturally. But unless we are made new creations in Christ, we will continue to do evil because it’s our natural inclination.

In the end, we are either created in God’s image, or we are not. Love and compassion are either part of God’s nature (and therefore to be reflected in us), or they are products of a random biological accident (and therefore unnecessary).

The question of God’s existence is of vital important because, on a practical level, if God does exist, there is a good chance that he wants to connect with us and that he requires the meeting of certain standards to make that happen. Further to that, our existence has significance (or insignificance) depending on the existence (or nonexistence) of God. So, the question is central to everything.

So back to the original question… “Has science proven there is no God?”. The resounding answer is NO! And God has made that clear if only people open their eyes, ears and hearts. Let’s pray to that end.