Who is a Christian? Who is a Muslim?

For many people the word “Christian” has lost or changed meaning.  It used to mean someone who was an authentic follower of Jesus.  Now it is often used as a synonym for nice, as in, “She’s a really Christian person,” or to describe someone who goes to church sometimes while rejecting the essentials of the [...]

The Telephone Game and the New Testament

Many people are familiar with the telephone game often used with kids to show the challenges and importance of clear communication.  It usually works with a message being given to one person who has a single chance to pass it along to another person.  By the time it gets to the end the message is [...]

Men wrote the Bible, so it must have mistakes?

A common objection to the assertion that God inspired the writings of the Bible is that men wrote it, so it must have mistakes.  Sadly, I have often heard this from committed Christians.
The argument usually goes like this:
Premise 1: Men wrote the Bible.
Premise 2: Men make mistakes.
Conclusion: God didn’t write the Bible.
But note that premise [...]

How many translations did your Bible go through?

One. 
Really. Just one time from the original language to the language and version of your Bible.  The original writings were copied many times, but the Bible you hold was probably only translated once.
Many people – including some Christians – are quick to say that the Bible has been translated and changed so many times over [...]

Confronting false teachings with truth and love

Oh no. He’s refuting my sermon points before I even speak.  Jesus, there’s either going to be radical transformation today, or I’m going to be chased to my car.  I shouldn’t have worn flip-flops.
Read this for a great example of how and why to preach the truth in love.   Someone from the congregation in Pretoria, South Africa, gave [...]

Inerrant, infallible, inspired

I’m re-running this post with some more thoughts.  Even though I believe that the original writings of the Bible were without error, God-breathed and incapable of error, those views aren’t required for belief in God or the resurrection.  You can take a minimal facts approach and see that even if there were slight discrepancies in the [...]

“Love your enemies?” Oh, Jesus was probably just being sarcastic.

I’m kidding, of course.  I don’t think Jesus was being sarcastic when He commanded us to love our enemies.  I used that title to point out two things:

It is easy for people to play games with scripture if they don’t follow some basic rules.  Most scripture-twisting isn’t as transparent as above, but it is just [...]

The Apostle Paul: Two major salvation lessons

There is a fabulous paradoxical combo-lesson about salvation from the life of Paul: (1) If someone as bad as Paul can be saved, then so can we and (2) If someone as good as Paul needed to trust in Jesus to be saved, then so do we.  In other words, he was so bad but [...]

Words, part 2

Another word that causes confusion in religious conversations is faith.  People use that word in many ways and it is easy to generate confusion if people operate from different definitions, no matter how well intentioned.
When addressing religious topics, some people (Christians and non-Christians) use it in the sense of “blind faith,” faith without evidence, or worst [...]

Do you know the Ten Commandments?

Whenever there is a debate over displaying the Ten Commandments in public I’m always afraid that the media will ask the more vocal proponents to list them and that they won’t be able to do so.  Perhaps I’m not giving the average Christian in the U.S. enough credit, but based on poll results I doubt [...]

Therapeutic moralistic deism

I’ve heard the phrase therapeutic moralistic deism used to describe a large part of Christianity / religiosity in America.  Based on survey results, it is what most churchgoers seems to believe.  It breaks down as follows.
Deism = There is some sort of God.
Therapeutic = This God wants to help us and wants us to be happy.
Moralistic = This [...]

New contender in the most abused Bible passage of the decade

Until recently the clear leader in this unfortunate contest was Matthew 7:1 –  Judge not, that you be not judged.  That verse was always handy for those who wanted to judge others for judging others (you read that right), because so few caught the hypocrisy and fewer still knew to read just a few more [...]

The Bible unplugged

Study Bibles, sermons, commentaries and Podcast lessons have been invaluable to me in understanding the Bible, but I still find value in just reading it without notes and such.  That’s a pretty unoriginal thought, I suppose, but it is easy to get in the habit of reading about the Bible and not just reading the [...]

Zeitgeist

Zeitgeist (“the spirit of the time”) is the name of a popular online video that claims that Christianity is founded upon themes borrowed from other religions.  When you dig into the specific assertions it fails miserably.  Here’s an overview from a good site and one of the examples of transparently bad reasoning the movie uses:
Zeitgeist [...]

Memorizing Bible verses

Psalm 119:9, 11 How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word. I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.
Memorizing verses may sound like an endeavor just for young children, but it is valuable for us all. It helps us know God’s [...]

The Telephone Game Part II

As I wrote back in 2007, many people are familiar with the telephone game often used with kids to show the challenges and importance of clear communication.  It usually works with a message being given to one person, who has one chance to pass it along to another person.  By the time it gets to [...]