The Gospel in a Nutshell

John 16:7-11 (ESV)  Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. 8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; 11 concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

In the time of Christ, speakers used methods to make it easy to memorize, or at least remember, the points of their teachings.  Jesus did this.  This was due to a very low literacy rate by today’s standards:  only about 10-15% of first-century Jews could read at all and only about 10% could read with comprehension.

Jesus uses a simple threefold structure here to help the disciples and the readers of John’s Gospel to remember what was said:

1. The Holy Spirit’s work is organized into three categories:

  • Sin
  • Righteousness
  • Judgment

Three-part lists are among the easiest forms of speech to remember. Jesus frequently used triads (e.g., “ask, seek, knock”; “the way, the truth, and the life”), and triads are common throughout both the Old and New Testaments.

2. Jesus repeats the same introductory phrase:

  • “concerning sin…”
  • “concerning righteousness…”
  • “concerning judgment…”

This repetition creates a rhythmic pattern that is much easier to memorize than three unrelated statements.

3. Each point is immediately explained:

  • Sin → because they do not believe in Me.
  • Righteousness → because I go to the Father.
  • Judgment → because the ruler of this world has been judged.

This consistent pattern (“topic → because → explanation”) provides a mental framework that helps listeners retain the teaching.

4. The three concepts are related yet distinct:

  • Human sin
  • Christ’s righteousness
  • Satan’s judgment

The movement from human guilt, to Christ’s vindication, to Satan’s defeat forms a logical progression that is easier to remember than disconnected ideas.

5. Jesus often spoke in balanced clauses. John preserves many of these balanced sayings:

  • “concerning sin…”
  • “concerning righteousness…”
  • “concerning judgment…”

Each phrase is similar in length and structure, giving the passage a cadence that aids oral transmission.

6. Each statement is remarkably concise. In just a few words Jesus summarizes profound theological truths:

  • The root of sin is unbelief.
  • Jesus’ ascension vindicates His righteousness.
  • Satan’s condemnation guarantees final judgment.

Such compressed statements are easier to memorize because they pack significant meaning into brief, memorable expressions.

Why is this important?

The structure of John 16:7-11 helps us as well to remember the three main points of the Gospel.  In our witness, we can bring these to mind easily and in that way explain the gospel in a very short order.  We only need to remember three words: sin, righteousness, and judgment to explain thoroughly what Jesus’ death, burial, resurrection, and ascension mean to a seeker.

There is only one sin that keeps us from the kingdom of God: denying Christ.

Jesus is the only way to come to the Father: only He is righteous enough to stand in the Father’s presence, and He offers that righteousness to all who would believe in Him.

Satan has been judged.  The most powerful being ever to work against the will of God has failed, has been condemned, and has been sentenced. When Jesus returns, that sentence will be carried out.

Problems of Evil

It’s been three years since I’ve written about the problem of evil.  Some of you have joined us in that time, so I’ll summarize the problem for you:

If God is all knowing, He would know how to end evil.

If God is all powerful, He would be able to end evil.

If God is all loving, He would want to end evil.

Evil exists.

Therefore, an all knowing, all powerful, all loving God does not exist.

The problem of evil (POE) has been around since three hundred years before Christ.  So long as someone believes there is a good, powerful, and loving God, the POE stands as an issue that needs to be dealt with.

This particular form addresses what is called the Moral Problem of Evil.  There are others, but this is the form most often presented to Christians to answer. 

“How can God allow planes to fly into towers and let 3,000 people die without cause?”  Usually it goes something like that.  There is something called the Freewill Defense first developed by the professor of philosophy, Alvin Plantinga of Notre Dame in his book, God, Freedom, and Evil.  He said that God loves us and wants us to love Him back.  True love must be freely given, so God would need to give us the ability both to love Him and to reject His love for us.  Those who reject God’s love are capable of doing ungodly things.  This would include flying into towers and killing people.

Another POE is The Natural Problem of Evil:

God is all-powerful

God is perfectly good

God knows all suffering

Natural disasters and diseases cause immense suffering

Therefore, such a God probably does not exist.

Natural disasters and diseases are not necessarily the result of someone’s sin:

Luke 13:4-5 (ESV)  Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

Here are some biblical reasons for the Natural Problem of Evil:

Creation was originally “very good” – Gen. 1:31

Human sin brought a curse upon creation – Rom. 8:20-22

God sometimes uses suffering for His purposes – John 9:1-3

God promises to remove natural evil – Rev. 22:3

Why is this important?

The problem of evil is the most frequently asked question of Christians and the question that most often goes unanswered.  We are to have an answer for those who ask of us:

1 Peter 3:15 (ESV)  15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

One Nation Under God

Today is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, so I thought it would be fitting to look at the role of Christianity, if any, in the founding of the United States.

There were 95 signers in total of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.  91 were Protestant, 3 were Roman Catholic, and one is uncertain – probably Ben Franklin, who was raised as a Protestant but did not live the life or proclaim a Christian belief later in life. 

Some claim Jefferson was a deist.  Jefferson himself said, “I am a sect by myself.”  It is true, though, that Jefferson denied the Trinity, the bodily resurrection, and the deity of Christ: three major doctrines of the Christian faith.  So, it is probable that Jefferson was not a Christian.

Prior to the Declaration of Independence, at least six of the colonies had official state-recognized denominations: Massachusets, Conneticut, New Hampshire, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina.  North Carolina had no official denomination but required a man to be a Protestant in order to hold office.

After the Declaration was signed, ten of the 13 states required a person to be a Christian in order to hold office.  By the Civil War, though, no state had an “official church,” but they still promoted moral education and Christian values informally in schools, politics, and public life.

This is all so different than what we see in 21st-century America, of course.  The reason is the definition of “church” began to change in the 1940s when the Supreme Court applied the Fourteenth Amendment to states.  The understanding of “Free Exercise” was broadened to define religion rather than denomination.  Then, some of the military draft conscientious objections of the 1960s went before the Supreme Court, and “Free Exercise” was broadened even more to mean a “sincere and meaningful belief occupying a place parallel to belief in God.”  This meant religion was no longer limited to traditional denominations or formal churches.

The Court, by the 1990s, defined “Religion” as “any sincerely held belief system about ultimate meaning,” and “Church” in law was defined as “any religious organization, not just Christian congregations.”  These definitions now included Native American religious practices, Non-theistic belief systems, and small or nontraditional religious groups.

There have been some attempts at turning the direction of America back toward being a Christian nation, though.  Promoting “In God We Trust” in schools and government buildings, expanding voluntary school prayer or Bible study programs in schools, and such.

In 2022, the Kennedy v. Bremerton School District decision by the Supreme Court allowed public school coaches to pray on the field under the banner of “historical practices and understandings.”  That same year, in Carson v. Makin, states were allowed to fund religious schools in tuition assistance programs if secular schools also qualified.

Still in dispute and headed for the Supreme Court are cases involving The Ten Commandments in classrooms, Religious charter schools, and prayer in public institutions.  Some things we can pray about.

Why Is This Important?

America’s historical laws and cultural moral standards ideally align well with those of the Bible.  Some examples:

Justice and Fairness-

Lev. 19:15 (ESV)  You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor.

Prov. 31:8-9 (ESV)  Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute. Open your mouth, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and needy.

The Moral and Criminal Law-

Ex. 20:13-16 (ESV)  “You shall not murder. 14 “You shall not commit adultery. 15 “You shall not steal. 16 “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

While we have lost many of the Christian standards our Founding Fathers gave us, there are still some Christian basics out there.  Our culture values helping one another, taking the hot seat for values we believe in, and fighting for the freedom of the oppressed.  On top of this, there is currently a movement to turn America back to God. Turning Point is active in this.

I heard someone say this morning that American was not formed against anything.  It was formed for things: for liberty, freedom, rights.  I like that.  We argue so much with people against what they believe, we forget the positives God has given us that still reside here in America.  We may have lost our footing a bit, but we are still the finest nation on earth.

To turn society toward God, the people need to be pointed His way.  This is done one individual at a time.  We have lost a lot, but God is still the one in charge.  His ability to change hearts is our best bet if we wish to move America forward to a more Biblical culture.  God still has people here; He’s still working here; His love is still apparent here.  Let’s rejoice that God has not given up on us, that this is still one nation under God.

Our Helper

The Helper

John 16:6-7 (ESV)  But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 7 Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.

In John 16, Jesus mentions a Helper that He will send to His disciples to help us in our ministry.  Most of us know this Helper is the Holy Spirit (John 14:26), but how much do we really know about His work in us and in our ministry for the kingdom?  This Helper is also called another Helper (John 14:16)

First, I’d like to look at the word another used in John 14:16.  According to the Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament (CWSDNT), the Greek word is allos and means another of the exact same kind, of equal quality; in this instance, it means the same kind as Jesus.  If it were another of a different kind, there is also a Greek word for that: heteros.  Jesus uses heteros in Matt. 6:24 when describing the fact we can’t serve two masters: God and money; he will hate the one and love the other (heteros).  So, the Helper here is another of the same sort of person as Jesus.

Some believe the Holy is just God’s energy or His active force, but being of the same quality and sort as Jesus shows the Holy Spirit is a person.  More on this later.

What sort of person is the Helper Jesus speaks of, and how will He work through us to accomplish God’s purpose in our lives?  The CWSDNT says the Greek word translated as Helper in John 16:7 is parakletos which is translated as a helper, an advocate, or an intercessor but means even more than that.  It also means a comforter, encourager, an exhorter, aid, a legal advisor, pleader, proxy, someone who comes forward in behalf of, and a representative.  The Holy Spirit is all of these things to the believer. Parakletos appears only five times in the New Testament, and all five are in John’s writings (John 14:16, 26, 15:26, 16:7, and 1 John 2:1).  In the First John verse, it is used to describe Jesus Himself: My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

Let’s look at some of the ways the Holy Spirit works in our lives:

Teacher – The Helper (the Holy Spirit) teaches believers and helps them understand God’s truth.

Jesus said he would teach believers and remind us of what He had said (John 14:26)

He enables us to understand the things freely given by God (1 Cor. 2:12-13)

Comforter – The Spirit strengthens and encourages believers.

                The church walks in the fear of the Lord and the comfort of the Holy Spirit (Acts. 9:31)

                We abound in hope through the power of the Holy Spirit (Rom. 15:13)

Advocate – The Spirit helps believers and intercedes for them

                The Spirit intercedes for believers according to the will of God (Rom. 8:26-27)

                The Spirit speaks through believers when we are brought before authorities (Matt. 19-20)

Truth Guide – The Spirit leads us into God’s truth.

                He will guide us into all truth (John 16:13)

                He reveals the deep things of God (1 Cor. 2:10-16)

Empowers Believers – The Spirit provides power for holy living and ministry.

                We receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon us (Acts. 1:8)

                The Spirit produces His fruit in believers (Gal. 5:22-23)

And for those who would doubt the Holy Spirit is a person, does a force do/have these?  Can you insult a force?  Can you lie to a force?  Can you blaspheme a force?  To put it another way, can you insult electricity, lie to radar, blaspheme gravity?

                The Holy Spirit:

  • Has a mind (Romans 8:27)
  • Knows (1 Corinthians 2:10-11)
  • Wills (1 Corinthians 12:11)
  • Loves (Romans 15:30)
  • Can be grieved (Ephesians 4:30)
  • Speaks (Acts 13:2)
  • Teaches (John 14:26)
  • Guides (John 16:13)
  • Testifies (John 15:26)
  • Commands (Acts 8:29)
  • Intercedes (Romans 8:26)
  • Can be lied to (Acts 5:3-4)
  • Can be resisted (Acts 7:51)
  • Can be insulted (Hebrews 10:29)
  • Can be blasphemed (Matthew 12:31-32)

Testing Everything

1 Thess. 5:15-22 (ESV)  See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. 16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 19 Do not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise prophecies, 21 but test everything; hold fast what is good. 22 Abstain from every form of evil.

Sometimes we read through passages, and suddenly God is commanding us to do something we aren’t equipped to do.  Take verse 21 above.  How do we test everything? 

Now this could just be telling us just to test spiritual things.  That narrows the field quite a bit, at least.  We can test prophecies, sermons, and the guys at the door telling us what they think the Bible says by simply studying the Bible further.  What is our test, our rule of thumb? The Bible itself.  God has given it to us to teach us, to reprove us, to correct us, to instruct us in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16).  That’s simple enough (not easy, but simple – as in “not complicated”). 

If you don’t know how to search through your Bible to find answers, I’d suggest the book The Navigator Bible Studies Handbook.  It’s less than $10 on Amazon.com and is written at a sixth-grade level, not some scholarly, high-and-lofty text.  It will change your Christian life by walking you through how to dig deeper into Scripture.

I don’t think, though, Paul is telling the Thessalonians just to check spiritual messages.  He gives a short shopping list that suggests we should test all things, even worldly things brought to us.  Let’s look at how we might do that.

In epistemology, we learn that we can only truly know things if we hold a justified true belief.  This is reasonable.  If we don’t believe it, we can’t know it.  If it isn’t true, we may believe a falsehood, but we can’t be said to know it.  And, if what we believe isn’t justified, we can’t really say we know it.  So, let’s see how we can arrive at these qualifications.

Justification.  Beliefs are justified in just a few ways, through testimony: we believe something because someone we trust tells us it’s true.  Through personal experience: we know something because we actually saw it happen.  What is called a priori evidence: this means we justify a belief because it aligns with something we already believe is true.  And, we can justify our belief logically:  If we can’t see the street from our window, but we can see it’s raining, it is logical to believe it is true that the street below is wet.

The most solid evidence for justification is personal experience.  This is because we want to seek out the closest source to the actual event or thought.  If we saw the rain, we are a very close source.  Only by going downstairs to see if the street is wet can we come closer to a more solid justification.

The poorest justification is hearing something from a third party, someone who tells us things not because they saw the event, but because they believe the event took place.  This is something like the old “Telephone Game” we used to play at grammar school parties.  We all sat in a circle and whispered something to the person next to us, then they whispered to the next person and so on.  Almost always, the message is misconstrued by the time it makes it through the circle.  We see this when watching the nightly news and an anchor is interviewing another anchor about an event they didn’t witness but have an opinion on.

Cults do this all the time as well.  They convince their followers that only the head of the cult should be trusted and to discount all other outside sources.  Limited information results in poor beliefs.

We should seek out sources as close as possible to the event, statement, or action in question and seek as many sources as possible, both pro and con, if you can find them.  Years ago, there was a news story of a shop owner in Los Angeles who shot a young woman in her store.  One evening news program showed security video of only the shooting.  Another program showed the young woman had been beating the shop owner, and the shop owner feared for her life.  That was why she shot the young woman.  Same story, two different presentations.  Because the young woman was of another race than the shop owner, the first program made it look like a racial shooting.  The second showed it was self-defense.  So, context matters as well as several reliable sources. Check all sources available.

Phil 4:8 (ESV)  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.

“Whatever is true.”  Let’s look at truth.  I have had people tell me, “It must be true.  The guy telling me this used the Bible.”  Over the past two thousand years, the Bible has been twisted and contorted by experts to make people believe almost anything (2 Peter 3:14-16). We need to be careful what we take in (Prov. 4:23).

I’d like to make a quick differentiation between opinion and fact here. They are not the same thing. Opinion is, “XYZ makes the best hot dogs in the world.” Fact is, “There are no married bachelors.” Opinions are subjective. They are not the truth. Facts are true.

Whoopie Goldberg once told Bill O’Reily, “My opinion is as valid as your facts.” That simply isn’t true. Opinions carry very little weight in finding truth. Facts do.

Two of the major theories of truth are the Correspondence Theory and the Coherence Theory.  The first states that something is true if it corresponds to reality.  The second says something is true if it coheres with beliefs you already hold.  Naturally, the Correspondence Theory is much less subject to error since it is based on reality alone. Still, most things we believe are based on the Correspondence Theory: things we hear that match what we already believe to be true.  What if we’re wrong to begin with, though?  Then we are subject to accepting information that agrees with our error.

Why is this important?

We need to be careful in what we accept as true.  Is it justified?   How certain can we be that it is true?  Once we find an idea, a report, or a testimony is well justified because it comes from a variety of sources, especially if they are both pro and con, we would be compelled to believe it – until further notice. We must be open to having our minds changed if the evidence against our belief is more certain and more objective.

It isn’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble.  It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.– anonymous

Twisting Scripture

2 Peter 3:15-16 (ESV)  And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, 16 as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.

Sometimes I get questions from other Christians asking how those of certain non-Christian organizations can call themselves Christian and keep their followers in the dark concerning what the Bible plainly says.  So, I thought it might be good to look at one specific passage in Colossians 1:15-19 that is often abused and see some of the deception the Watchtower uses to persuade its followers that what the organization teaches is actually biblical.

Col. 1:15-19 (NWT)  He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; because by means of him all other things were created in the heavens and on the earth, the things visible and the things invisible, whether they are thrones or lordships or governments or authorities. All other things have been created through him and for him. Also, he is before all other things, and by means of him all other things were made to exist, and he is the head of the body, the congregation. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might become the one who is first in all things; because God was pleased to have all fullness to dwell in him,

First, I should say the Watchtower organization teaches that Jesus is a created being in order to deny His deity. A Jesus who isn’t God is a Jesus who can’t save you: “Since Jesus as the firstborn of all creation is a created person, he cannot be Almighty God.” (Awake 4/8/79, p. 29)

The first point I need to make in the passage here is the meaning of the word Firstborn.  We have talked about the equivocation fallacy here before.  Equivocation is to assign a single meaning to a word when it has more than one definition.  We intuitively recognize this in humor: “The difference between a hippo and a Zippo is one is very heave and the other is a little lighter.”   The word lighter has more than one meaning, of course.  We know that and so might laugh at how it is implied here.

The same fallacy is at work with “firstborn” in the mind of a Jehovah’s Witness.  They think firstborn always means the first one born.  In both Greek and Hebrew culture, the firstborn was both the first one born and the preeminent one in a family or over a particular group.  Jesus was Mary’s firstborn son (Luke 2:7), the first son born to Mary.  That is a clear definition as the first one born.  But does it always mean that?

In Psalm 89, the word is used differently:  Ps. 89:27 And I will make him the firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth. Who was the firstborn mentioned here?  It was David, the youngest of Jesse’s eight sons.  So, what does firstborn mean in Psalm 89?  It means that although David was not the first son born of Jesse, he will have preeminence over the kings of the earth as God’s firstborn.

In Genesis 48:14, we’re told Manasseh is the firstborn son and Ephraim, his brother is the youngest, yet Jeremiah 31:9 tells us Ephraim has become the firstborn, the preeminent one.

So, how do we know there true meaning of the word in a specific passage?  We look at the context.  Colossians 1:18-19 (ESV) says this:  And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,

Verse 18 says the passage is speaking not of birth order but of preeminence. It also can’t mean the first one born of the dead, since there were others raised from the dead before Jesus. He Himself raised Lazarus, for instance.

Now, on to another change made by the Watchtower’s translation to mislead the reader.  The word other has been inserted into the passage four times.  It is not in the Greek, yet in the original 1950 publication of their New Testament, it was inserted as if it were supposed to be there, making Jesus one of the things created. 

In the 10/15/1950 Watchtower Magazine (p. 400) they said this about their translation:  “This translation, accomplished by the New World Bible Translation Committee, is highly accurate, taking into account the latest Bible research.”

Yet, in their comment on Colossians 1:16 in New World Translation Study Edition, they admit they have changed the text to suit their own doctrine:  “A literal rendering of the Greek text would be “all things.” (Compare Kingdom Interlinear.) However, such a rendering could give the impression that Jesus was not created but was the Creator himself.” They wouldn’t want anyone to understand the true meaning of the text.

Why is this important?

There are many groups out there who are more than willing to change Scripture to suit their bias and need for power over others.  Jehovah’s Witnesses are constantly telling us how dedicated they are to God’s name, Jehovah.  Scripture tells us God values His name above or on an equal level with His own Word:

Ps. 138:2 (NKJV)  I will worship toward Your holy temple, And praise Your name For Your lovingkindness and Your truth; For You have magnified Your word above all Your name.

Yet the Watchtower is willing to change the very Word of God to support doctrines that aren’t in the text.

What an Awesome God

Some evenings I go into the backyard of my house before heading to bed. Out there under the star-studded Arizona sky, I often feel the presence of God. “Thank You” is all I can say to Him, but it seems to be enough. The God of all that I see and more has loved me enough to not just notice me but to join me. What an awesome God He is.

In a couple of previous posts, I’ve covered a little about God being infinite, and I thought I’d expand on that a little today.  Forgive me if my math is wrong.  I wasn’t a math major but a philosophy major, although some philosophers were great mathematicians like Pascal and DesCartes, it isn’t true of me. 

This post stems from an interesting discussion I’ve been having with a Jehovah’s Witness about the Trinity and how God can be three Persons but one God.  During this discussion, I have been trying to explain as best I can God’s infinity.

In past blogs, I’ve defined infinity as a number so great it cannot be counted.  There are a lot of atomic particles in the universe, but there is not an infinite number of particles.  They could be counted if we only had the time.  It is estimated that the number is 10^80.  That’s a lot.  Not a weekend project, counting those.  But infinity is even greater, and it comes with seeming contradictions.  Infinity cannot be divided, added to, or multiplied with the result being a greater or lesser number.  It can be subtracted from, but only infinity from itself, resulting in zero.

So, if God is infinite and He has three “parts” (I’ll use that word since there isn’t a word I know that describes a part of infinity), then each of the three parts is the same number as the combination of the parts.  Each of the three parts/Persons is exactly equal to the other two.

To add to the issue, God is neither limited temporal nor is He limited spatially.  On top of all that, God is equally and fully present at any spot in the universe.  God is actually infinite, meaning He is infinite by nature, has always been infinite, and will always be infinite.  You and I are potentially temporally infinite.  We had a beginning, but we will potentially live an infinite amount of time going forward.

To get back to the contradictions involved, if the Son is infinite, then He is fully equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit, and with God as a whole.  He is not equal to the Trinity since He is distinct from the other two Persons of the Trinity.

They are all equal in essence, equal in nature, equally infinite.

The reason this is so difficult to understand, besides my still thinking it through and not fully understanding it myself, is because we have no infinity to experience or observe ourselves to place it up against. 

Time past is not infinite because infinity is a number that is beyond counting; we would have to cross an uncountable number of events to reach today.  There could not even be a starting point for an infinite series of events.

It appears we don’t have an infinite in space either.  Space is measured as the distance between two points.  Once we run out of things (points), we might run out of space and enter a void. Some cosmologists believe there is a void outside of our universe.  No matter the theory, the universe is still pretty big.  According to the NASA/WMAP, the current estimate of the observable universe is about 93 billion light-years across.  That still isn’t infinity. 

Why is this important?

Our God is an awesome God.  He is located in every inch of that 93 billion light-years spatially and was there when the universe began (Gen. 1:1; John 1:3).

As you can see from the confusion I’ve laid out, and probably added to, anything our finite minds might create in an attempt to understand an infinite God ends up approaching babble.  I don’t think we should stop trying to understand Who and What God is, though.  He gave us a mind to use in our love and worship of Him (Matt. 22:37).  I think He sees our meager attempts as acts of love.  We’re trying to draw nearer to the great and awesome God of all.

More Unanswerable Questions

Every so often, I search through some of the anti-Christian sites to find interesting questions they say Christians can’t answer.  Some are pretty foolish.  Some are truly unanswerable since they are “Why” questions about God’s actions or seeming inaction.  No one knows the mind of God unless He explains some of the whys.

Here are a few I found I thought were thought provoking from here: https://schoolandtravel.com/christianity-questions-that-cannot-be-answered/

  1. Does God have free will?  This poses a definition problem.  We would need to define “free will.”  If the question is “Can God do anything He likes?” then yes. He would be acting within His nature.  If it is “Can God do anything at all?” then no.  God cannot and will not do anything that is against His nature (like sin) or is logically impossible (make a rock He can’t move, etc.)
  2.  What crime deserves to be punished for all time? The crime of rejecting God’s gift.  Because we have freely chosen sin in our lives and God, as a purely Holy being, cannot allow sin in His presence, all of mankind “deserves to be punished (separated from God) for all time.”  But God loves us and has set up a “work around” for that.  He has paid the payment we should have paid for the sins we should not have committed by offering His Son’s perfect human life.  The payment has been made for all mankind, but God will not force you to spend eternity in a place you reject.  It is up to us as individuals to accept that payment on our behalf by asking Jesus to be our Savior, or else we can reject it and accept the deserved punishment.
  3. When you say that Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit are all one God, what does that mean to you?  The use of the term “God” for the Father here is confusing to the non-Christian.  The trinity doctrine states that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are the three persons in which God chooses to exist.  God is one Being but three persons: one what but three whos. That is what it means to us.
  4. Does it make sense for Christians to pray to Jesus in the hopes that he will talk to God [the Father] on their behalf?  It’s perfectly reasonable to pray to Jesus on our own behalf.  This is part of the system God has set up.  Since Jesus is both God and man, He has a foot in both worlds, so to speak.  He knows first person what it is like to be both human and divine.  Who better to be our Advocate: 1 John 2:1 (ESV)  My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
  5. Is the way you understand the Bible right?  Almost certainly not, at least not completely.  God has given us a lot of information in the Bible for us to understand.  Some of what is given there is beyond understanding, and some is difficult to understand and easy to misunderstand.  A Christian would be arrogant to think he understands completely all that God has taught.  We have human minds and are trying to understand an infinite intellect.  The basics God wants us to understand are plainly written.  There are difficult and controversial sections of Scripture.  I believe God wants us to discuss and learn from these as a community.  We are to love God with our minds, after all: Mark. 12:30 (ESV) And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
  6. Would you [commit sin] if God told you to?  I changed the original wording of this question because I felt it was inappropriate for this site. The basic idea is a good one, though.  You can look it up, if you like, at the address given above.  One answer to this is found in my answer to question #1 above.  God will not do (or ask us to do) anything which does not align with His nature.  However, if God asked me to do something, no matter what, I would do it because God is the standard of morality.  God doesn’t say and do things because they are good.  They are good because God says and does them.  Sometimes God does honor what might be considered as sin in another context.  He honored Rahab’s lie, for instance. There seems to be a hierarchy involved at times, much like we see in our laws. I can jump a fence and trespass on a neighbor’s property to save a child drowning in their pool, as an example.
  7. Is there any amount of proof that will make you stop believing in Christianity?  Yes.  You would just need to prove Jesus has not risen from the dead: 1 Cor. 15:17 (ESV)  And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. By the way, the resurrection of Christ is the best document event in the ancient world with no fewer than seven eyewitnesses writing about having seen it.
  8. Why are the miracles of today less impressive than those of the Bible?  I’m not sure they are.  I’ve witnessed a complete healing of a friend with lumps in her breasts.  The doctor examined her the day before she was to have surgery, and they were there.  We prayed for a healing that evening.  The next day he checked again just before she was to be worked on, and no lumps.  There is also a book written by evangelist Mel Tari, Like a Mighty Wind, which records many miracles done in Indonesia in 1965, comparable to the works seen in the New Testament.  Several other miracles are recorded and some videoed involving healings.  We don’t see a lot of miracles in the West, I believe, because of the lack of or the superficiality of our faith.

Why is this important?

I thought these eight questions were fairly representative of some of the questions asked of Christians by non-believers.  We need to be prepared to answer these and others like them, and from time to time we will post some here with what we believe are fair answers.

Prayer, Physician, or Both?

The question often comes up, “Should a Christian go to a physician for a physical issue or depend wholly upon God?”  While, I can’t speak for anyone out there, this is a decision you need to make on your own through prayer and the counsel of mature Christian friends, I will give a few things to think about here.

First, I’d like to relate a personal experience that has some bearing on the issue.  I experienced a heart attack last June.  I couldn’t catch my breath.  My wife, and later my sister-in-law, recognized what was happening and rushed me to the local hospital emergency room, where doctors inserted two stents.  My life was saved. 

In the past nearly eleven months, I have grown in my walk with God and taught people several things: how to study the Bible for themselves, apologetics, basics of the faith, and such.  Yesterday, after I taught a short Bible study at a local nursing home, a woman came to me and said the message was for her specifically, that it pointed out a need in her life she needed to correct.  We praised God together.

The reason I bring these things up is that God had more for me to do.  We don’t know what would have happened if my wife had dropped to her knees and prayed for me rather than taking me to the hospital.  We do know, however, that God blessed her actions instead. My thinking is more toward the idea that God uses physicians, but mine is not the only view.

Some additional things to think about are more Biblically centered:

  • Paul calls Luke “the beloved physician.”  Paul lists very few people with their occupations.  One is Erastus (Rom 6:23), as the city treasurer, a very prestigious position indeed.  Zenas (Titus 3:13) as a lawyer.  We’re not sure if he was a Roman legal expert or a Jewish expert in the Mosaic law.  Either plays an important role.  So, the few and the significant are listed by Paul in his letters.
  • Paul tells Timothy to take a little wine for his stomach problems (1 Tim. 5:23).  This would suggest turning to a remedy, a medication, for a physical ailment rather than waiting for a miracle.  We might think, “this is just a simple thing,” but isn’t everything a simple thing to an omnipotent God?
  • Look at Mark 2:17 (ESV), And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”  Though the context is the need for sinners to come to Him, still Jesus speaks of the need of the sick for a physician.  Is this an endorsement of private medicine?  You decide.
  • Isa. 38:21 (ESV)  Now Isaiah had said, “Let them take a cake of figs and apply it to the boil, that he may recover.”  Here Isaiah used a combination of God’s promise Hezekiah would recover and a physical remedy to accomplish his healing.

In addition, God tells us to pray for the sick

  •  James 5:14-15 (ESV)  Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. 

God is the ultimate Healer:

  • Ps. 103:2-3 (ESV)  Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases,

Why is this important?

I don’t see where either going to a physician or not going to a physician is commanded.  God leaves many things up to our own choice, including the clothes we wear, what sort of car we drive, and where we go on vacation.  Perhaps going to a doctor is a matter of free will.  One person told me, “I will always pray first.  That prayer may be in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, but I’ll pray before the doctors go to work.”

My conclusion? I’m going to pray for God to strengthen the hands and minds of the physician.  If God wants to take me, nothing will keep me alive.  If He wants me to live, I see nothing that keeps me from seeking medical help.

If the need isn’t immediate, though, I would ask the elders of the church to pray for me as well as family and friends.  If I don’t improve, the next step is to see if God wants to use a physician.

Christ Our Nurishment

John 15:1-5 (ESV) “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. 2 Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 3 Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

This is part of the Upper Room Discourse, where Jesus is giving His final encouragement and instructions to His disciples.  Jesus knows He will be captured this evening and crucified the following day.  What do you think He would have to say?

In these five verses, Jesus is telling His disciples that their strength to bear fruit comes only from Him.  He is the source of our spiritual nourishment, and Him alone.  It also speaks of the Father as the vinedresser, the one who tends the vineyard, pulls the weeds, cleanses the branches and leaves, harvests the fruit, and prunes the vines to produce more fruit and better fruit.

I don’t believe this is speaking of the power of the Holy Spirit within us.  I think it is speaking of the strength Jesus gives us to accomplish the ministry (produce the fruit) He has for us to do.

The fruit we produce can manifest itself in at least two ways: it can be found in our lives as the fruit of the Spirit we see in Galatians 5:22: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  I personally see this as a sort of dashboard with gauges, one for each of the fruits, and needles pointing to a level I am at.  They show whether I am progressing or losing ground.  I check these gauges frequently to see how I’m doing and if I’m allowing God to produce fruit in me.

Turning back to the vinedresser, He prunes the branches.  He cuts away the “sucker” growth, the growth that draws away the nourishment from the branches and causes the fruit to be of poorer quality.  We Christians are often drawn from the work God has for us.  We’re pulled away by competing interests.  Some are good, some are bad.

My wife and I were anxious to serve God in the church we attended years ago, and as a result, we said “yes” to just about everything that was asked of us.  Before long, we were burned out.  Yes, God had areas where He wanted us to serve, but not in all the areas where we were serving.  Unsure what to do, we left that church. Though we had joined another church, we missed the people and returned more than a year later.  We had made an agreement between the two of us, though, to only work in ministries where we were sure God had called us.  This gave us renewed strength, renewed nourishment from the vine, to accomplish the things we were called to do.

I think God gives us just the nourishment to do these things.  Doing much more saps the strength we’ve been given, and our callings suffer.  These other things may even be God’s work, but for someone else’s service, not ours.  In taking on that ministry, we may be robbing a brother or sister of the joy of serving where God wants them.

Why is this important?

Drawing our nourishment from the Vine, Jesus, gives us the strength to do His will in our lives.  When we venture into someone else’s area of service, we can lose some of that strength, and our own ministry suffers.  It can even cause others to lose the reward of God’s grace and power in performing the service where God has called them. 

Of course, we Christians are anxious to serve our Lord.  Because we love him, we want to please Him.  What we don’t want is to do several things poorly – some of which are not ours to do – when we should do only the few things God has asked of us and do them well.