Loving Your Spouse Through The Seasons Of Marriage
Debra Fileta has identified the four seasons of marriage that correspond with our natural seasons spring , summer , fall , and winter . In this interview, she will help couples better understand the four seasons of healthy relationships, what to expect during each one, and how to carefully navigate them for a stronger marriage.
Teleological Argument For Gods Existence
This argument can be illustrated in the story of where my automatic watch came from. As you may know, an automatic watch is a mechanical wonder, full of gears and weights and jewels. It is precise and needs no battery the movement of ones wrist keeps it wound.
One day, as I was walking on the beach, the sand began to swirl in the wind. The earth around my feet was also moving, probably due to geologic forces. The elements and materials began to come together. After a good while of random swirling the watch began to take shape, and when the process was complete, my finished watch was ready to wear, set to the right time and all.
Of course, such a story is nonsense, and any rational reader would see it as fanciful story- telling. And the reason that it is such obvious nonsense is because everything about a watch points to a designer. Someone collected the materials, formed and shaped and manufactured the parts, and assembled it according to a design.
The teleological argument, put most simply, is that design demands a designer. When we observe nature, which is billions of times more complex than the most advanced wrist watch, we can see that things have design, which is evidence of a designer.
Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
Gods Glory In Creation
God intends for us to have a well-grounded conviction that he is the powerful, wise, merciful Creator and sustainer of the world by means of a sight of his glory.
Psalm 19:1 says, The heavens declare the glory of God. Notice! The heavens the sun and moon and stars and galaxies are not themselves the glory of God. We are not pantheists. The heavens are not God. And their glory is not the glory of God. They are telling pointing to the glory of God. Which means you must have eyes to see through the glory of nature to the glory of God. Many non-Christian scientists see glory in the universe. Charles Misner said that Einstein had seen much more majesty than the preachers had ever imagined, and it seemed to him that they were just not talking about the real thing. So we have Psalm 19:1 showing us that the sight of glory can give us a well-grounded confidence that this universe is of God.
Then even more importantly, Paul says in Romans 1:1921,
What can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
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Answered Prayers: Prayer Proves Gods Existence
Answered prayers show that God is real. Millions of Christians have prayed Gods will and their prayers were answered. I have prayed things that were answered by God in a way that I know it was only Him that could have done it. It is always good as a believer to have a prayer journal to write down your prayers.
1 John 5:14-15And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.
Not My Will But The Will Of The One Who Sent Me
For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.
Jesus’s entire life was marked by a steady inclination to do Gods will. Nothing would distract or deter Him from fulfilling what God had called Him to do. This is a critical mindset for us to have, even when we don’t have complete clarity on God’s plans. We need to be committed to being obedient to what we know. And as we obey, the next steps become more explicit.
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Alleged Errors In Transcribing
When the Word of God was reproduced to make another copy, well before the printing press was invented, there were 70 scribes that worked on it with expert precision second to none. Imagine that each of the scribes had the other sixty-nine scribes check their writings for error. Each of these seventy scribes reviewed each others work and every written copy, letter by letter, line by line, book by book were examined meticulously. If any errors were found, the started all over again on that particular book or page. Imagine youre one of the scribes and you have just finished a section. Now the other sixty-nine scribes check your work and compare it to the original. The amazing fact is that their methods resulted in such an accurate reproduction of scripture that only one error for every fifteen hundred words occurred and these errors were so slight that they never affected the content. This copying left absolutely no room for any private interpretation or mistranslation at all. By modern standards, the accuracy rate is superior to that of Microsofts Spelling and Grammar Check, which by the way is not perfect. When you consider the stringent guidelines and conditions, no one can dispute that the translation differences had any negative effect on the message of the Bible or its general context.
Gods Glory In The Gospel
Here is another analogy the most important one of how Gods glory authenticates the word of God namely, the way the glory of God vindicates the gospel.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:4, The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. The gospel, the story of how God came to save sinners, emits a supernatural light to the eyes of the heart the light of the gospel of glory of Christ. Christs self-authenticating glory shines through the gospel. And God shatters the blindness in 2 Corinthians 4:6: God, who said, Let light shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
So the light is called in verse 4 the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. And the light is called in verse 6 the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Paul is saying that the way we come to know that the Christian gospel, as recorded in Scripture, is true is by a sight of its glory. The glory of God in the face of Christ. The glory of Christ, the image of God.
God reveals his glory not only in the sovereign majesty of the lion, but also in the gentle meekness of the lamb.
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Does Our View Of The Bible Matter
Liberal theologians sometimes point out that our view of the Bible doesnt really matter. So long as we gain strength and insights from it, they say, that is enough. Following this line of reasoning, they remove many miracles of the Bible or simply treat them as myths. This is a mistake, particularly when it comes to the Resurrection of Christ. Our view of the Bible matters immensely, especially if what it claims is indeed true. If it is, as we have argued, then our eternal destiny hinges on how we will respond to Christ and His calling. Will we reject Him or accept Him?
There is much more that could be said on the matter of truth and the Bible. Learn more by checking out some of our other articles on the Christian Worldview.
Steve Green, Chairman of the Board for the Museum of the Bible, discusses the immeasurable influence the Bible has had on society and the amazing biblical artifacts that are part of a huge collection that are on display at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.
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Ontological Argument For Gods Existence
There are many forms of the Ontological Argument, all of which are very complex and many have been abandoned by modern theist apologists. In its simplest form the argument works from the idea of God to the reality of God.
Since man believes that God exists, God must exist. Man could not have an idea of God in the mind if the reality of God did exist. Since this argument is so complex, and since most find it unpersuasive, this briefest of summaries is probably sufficient.
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How To Find The Answers
On you’ll go, maybe in one conversation, more likely in several, to help your teen discover answers. Some answers you won’t fully find until heaven, but you’ll keep a list of those and keep researching. In the meantime you can:
- Go directly to God for the answers,
- Act on what you already know ,
- Continue asking and gathering information until you understand.
This article is courtesy of Parenting Teens magazine.
Spiritual Beauty Shines Through
Forty years ago, when I was thirty years old, Jonathan Edwards sowed the seed that finally grew into a published plant called A Peculiar Glory: How the Christian Scriptures Reveal Their Complete Truthfulness. So what I would like to do is invite you into the process of my thinking that led me to this particular way of articulating the ground of my confidence in Scripture.
Notice that I did not say that I invite you into the process of my thinking that led me to confidence in Scripture, but rather the process that led me to this particular way of articulating the ground of my confidence in Scripture. Ive been confident in Scripture since I was a child. And it is owing to the very nature of the ground of that confidence that makes it possible to be confident with a genuinely warranted, well-grounded confidence when you are seven, and yet not render a full-orbed articulation of that ground until you are seventy. It would be like knowing at seven that I can see, and only writing a theory of light and a physiology of the eye when I am seventy.
The answer I have tried to unfold is that there is a divine glory a peculiar glory, a spiritual glory, not a physical one, a distinguishing spiritual beauty that shines in and through the meaning of Scripture and shows it to be the word of God. This divine glory can be seen for what it really is by the eyes of the heart, which Paul refers to in Ephesians 1:18.
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The Bible Shines A Peculiar Glory
My conclusion is that, just as God confirms that the world is his by revealing his glory through it, and that Jesus is the Son of God by revealing Gods glory through him, and the gospel is the gospel of God by revealing his glory through it, in the same way, the whole Bible authenticates itself by shining with the glory of the one who inspired it. Which means that we know that the Scriptures are the word of God because in their true meaning we see the self-authenticating glory of God. Or to use the words of Jonathan Edwards, The mind ascends to the truth of the gospel but by one step, and that is its divine glory.
Of course, the problem is that by nature we are blind to the glory of God. We suppress it. We love the darkness, Jesus says . Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:14, The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. We have eyes, but we do not see. Ears, but we do not hear.
The only hope for us to see the glory of God in Scripture, and have a well-grounded confidence that it is the word of God, is for God to perform a miracle and take away our spiritual blindness that we are all born with. And Paul says God, in fact, does do this. God comes to us and he speaks a word of new creation just like he did in the old creation and says, Let there be light . And we are given life and new spiritual eyes that can see what is really there.
Arguments For God’s Existence That Christians Should Know
Throughout history, if authors have fabricated a book, then the truth comes out. In all my years of existence, I have never heard of someone proving that the Bible is inaccurate. I have seen authors on famous talk shows with an allegedly best-selling book. Then, I saw the follow-up months or years later, when they had to recant details of a book that should have been listed as fiction. I have not seen these particular arguments for the Bible.
I have seen high-profile atheists take out commercial time on television to tell us that they are not afraid of God and hell. Then, I have seen those commercials abruptly stop. They ran out of money, or God stopped it. For years, Madalyn Murray O’Hair spouted off about her unbelief in God. She was significant in helping to get prayer out of schools. She, too, had an expiration date and had to meet God.
The argument for God and His existence is so widespread and fundamental to life that even the world has taken principles from the birth of God’s Son Jesus and commercialized it as Christmas. Christians love this celebration. Even those who are not Christians participate because everyone loves the holiday season. Here too, is proof of God’s existence and how the world catches on.
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Giving Up Sugar Tasting God’s Goodness
As a latchkey kid, Wendy Speake turned to sugar for comfort. Every Friday, she would pedal to the candy show and use her allowance to fill her bag with candy. And one day, when she was older and a mom of three young boys, she came to realize that she was still pedaling away from her stress and using sugar as comfort, instead of turning to Jesus. She was joyless, worn out, tired, and in need of a change. In this interview, Wendy will challenge Christians to take 40 days to focus on fasting from something they turn to instead of Jesus for comfort. She invited people to break free from a dependence on sugar and taste the goodness of God.
Gods Will Of Decree Or Sovereign Will
Lets see the passages of Scripture that make us think this way. First consider passages that describe the will of God as his sovereign control of all that comes to pass. One of the clearest is the way Jesus spoke of the will of God in Gethsemane when he was praying. He said, in Matthew 26:39, My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will. What does the will of God refer to in this verse? It refers to the sovereign plan of God that will happen in the coming hours. You recall how Acts 4:2728 says this: Truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. So the will of God was that Jesus die. This was his plan, his decree. There was no changing it, and Jesus bowed and said, Heres my request, but you do what is best to do. Thats the sovereign will of God.
And dont miss the very crucial point here that it includes the sins of man. Herod, Pilate, the soldiers, the Jewish leaders they all sinned in fulfilling Gods will that his Son be crucified . So be very clear on this: God wills to come to pass some things that he hates.
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