Josh McDowell's Blog, page 26
May 5, 2019
God, Our Relevant Father
A Father’s Presence Matters
Many people would agree that Will Smith made his career through his great performance in the old TV show Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, a sitcom in which Will plays a fictionalized younger version of himself as a poor boy from Philadelphia who moved in with his rich aunt and uncle in Bel-Air.
Many also would say that Will’s greatest performance in Fresh Prince was that poignant father scene. If you viewed that scene, you know what I’m talking about. In that episode, Will’s biological father pays him a visit after abandoning the family 14 years earlier. He promises to take Will on a nice father-son trip — but cancels at the last minute.
Will is heartbroken, though he manages to hold himself together as he watches his father walk out the door — and out of his life. He tries to shake off the pain with the help of his sympathetic uncle, but the pressure on his heart expresses itself first in raging anger, then tears. “How come he don’t want me, man?” asks Will as his uncle pulls him into a tight bear hug and they cry together. The typically funny sitcom dove into the painful.
This certainly isn’t the only tv/film scene featuring an emotionally gripping “father moment.” How many movies can you think of where the protagonist has a tenuous relationship with his or her father? The darkest moment in these films tends to be when the father rejects his son or daughter. And the brightest moment is when the father returns and restores the relationship.
Fathers. Their existence (or non-existence) in our lives burrows deep, affecting our very soul. Those of us who grew up with absent fathers often struggle with belonging. Those who grew up with abusive fathers often struggle with passivity. Those who grew up with unloving fathers often struggle with acceptance. These are all overly-simplistic generalizations, but fathers matter. We can all attest to the truth of this statement, based on our own personal experience. A father is critically relevant to a child.
Isn't it interesting that in the Bible, the God of heaven and earth, infinitely powerful, all-knowing and perfectly holy, addresses Himself as our Father?
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God: Our Good, Good Father
It isn’t an accident that God calls Himself our Father. He presents Himself to us in the most tender way, holding us in love from that deep place in our soul. He is never an absent father. He is never an abusive father. He is never an unloving father. God is the father who sees us, knows us, and understands us. He loves our personalities and desires to be us with. Let’s be honest: our hearts cry out for this full acceptance. God is so relevant to our life!
I don’t mean to suggest that our Heavenly Father makes our earthly father irrelevant or unimportant. Or that God is the instant cure-all for any father wounds we experience as we grow up. My point is that the relationship God offers to each of us goes deep, to our very core. It’s not superficial, conditional, or fleeting. It can meet the needs of every person, in every culture, because God completely knows us.
God is with us when no one else is. He loves us when no one else does. He makes Himself present in our lives and in the lives of our fellow brothers and sisters as we gather together. We don’t need to have our act together before coming to God. I’m telling you: the God of this universe is a good Father!
Right here, right now, and in Heaven, where we’ll be with Him in person. Heaven, by the way, is not about strumming on a harp, or enjoying a bunch of virgins, or even governing our own planet. It’s not about escaping desire, or becoming part of the cosmos, or enjoying an endless all-we-can-eat ice cream buffet without bellyache.
Heaven is about our one-on-one relationship with God! Revelation 21:4 says that In Heaven every tear will be wiped from our eyes. That’s beautiful, but not the real beauty of Heaven. The real beauty of Heaven is that He will be the one wiping away our tears!
“How come he don’t want me, man?” isn’t a question we can ever ask about God. He wants us fiercely, wholly, and unconditionally. Let’s run to that love! Oh, that our entire world would long for and come to know our amazing, utterly relevant Father.
In our next blog post, let’s look more at how our self-image is affected by our relationships.
Catch up: The introductory post to this series.
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April 27, 2019
If I Can’t See God, How Do I Know He Is Real? Quick VIDEO
Original post by Sean McDowell here. Used with permission.
Sean McDowell, Ph.D. is a professor of Christian Apologetics at Biola University, best-selling author, popular speaker, part-time high school teacher, and the Resident Scholar for Summit Ministries, California. Follow him on Twitter: @sean_mcdowell and his blog: seanmcdowell.org.
The post If I Can’t See God, How Do I Know He Is Real? Quick VIDEO appeared first on Josh.org.
April 25, 2019
Self-Image: Five Steps To Overcome Shame
As I mentioned in my previous post, our shame and self-image plays a significant factor in the unhealthy thoughts and actions we struggle with on a daily basis. Many of us don’t yet see ourselves as God sees us, because we’re stuck in seeing ourselves as the world, friends, and even the haters see us (#HatersGonHate). We struggle to love our neighbor as ourself because we don’t love ourself (Matthew 22:39). We struggle to accept God’s love for us because we view life through the filter of our shame.
Shame has been at the root of mankind’s struggle since day one, when sin entered the Garden of Eden. But Jesus can break the chains of shame.
Jesus healed much of my shame and negative self-view through the five steps I share below. I believe they’ll help you find healing and freedom too.
It took a proactive daily choice, and praying for God’s healing, to overcome my “worthless sinner” shame mentality. Jesus brought healing and freedom through these five steps. I encourage you to take them, too.
1. Understand What God Says About You
I began to study and understand what God says about me through Scripture.
I learned that I have inherent value and dignity (Genesis 1:27), that I am loved for who I am (Ephesians 2:4), that I am uniquely gifted (1 Peter 4:10), and that I am here for a purpose (Ephesians 2:10). That Christ defeated not just sin, but the effects of sin on the cross — including shame. Jesus gave me a new identity as a son of God when I began a personal relationship with Him (1 John 3:1) and received His forgiveness for my wrongs. These understandings developed the mindset I needed for this truth to begin to sink deep into my heart.
2. Surround Yourself With People Who Affirm the Truth of Who God Says You Are
I began to surround myself with people who affirmed my true value, who loved me for who I was, and who accepted and encouraged me.
These affirming experiences helped the truth of my value in God’s eyes to sink into my head and heart.
3. Stop Listening to Certain Voices
I stopped listening to the voices of those who perpetuated the “worthless sinner” mentality in my life — including certain bible teachers, authors, bloggers, and friends.
If you listen closely, you’ll start to notice how many Christians teach that “humans are evil and bad,” rather than the Biblical truth which is “humans are broken.” When you start paying close attention, you’ll begin to realize how many obsess about sin and the old self (Romans 6:6), rather than putting their emphasis on our inherent value as the pinnacle of God’s creation (Genesis 1:26-27), His love for us, and our new identity as saints (Galatians 2:20, Colossians 1:11-13, Ephesians 2:18-20).
4. Cut the Trash-Talking Voice of Shame
I made the conscious decision to cut out the trash-talking voice of shame in my head.
For years, I had been turning inward on myself, letting my thoughts and emotions run wild. I routinely told myself negative things like, “Yeah, I guess I am worthless,” and “I can’t do anything right,” which only reinforced the deeply rooted lies. For years, when I felt really sad about myself or situations in my life, I’d just sit with it rather than confront the lies that lead to the deep sadness. How self-defeating was that?! I’m not sure how many lies Satan whispers to us, because we do a pretty good job of feeding them to ourselves.
I’m not sure how many lies Satan whispers to us, because we do a pretty good job of feeding them to ourselves.
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5. Meditate on the Truth
I began meditating, morning and night, on specific verses about who God is and who I am as His loved, righteous, redeemed son.
Whenever the lies about myself came up, I’d take those thoughts captive and make them obedient to the truth of Christ in that scenario: who I am in Christ. For this to not simply be intellectual, but to sink into my heart, I visualized past experiences with God, where I had encountered His presence, love, and goodness.
Shame Off You
Each of the above steps drew me closer to God, because I began to see Him for who He truly is: my loving Father. As my default view of myself began to change, I was freed up to share the love I was experiencing with others. As I got God’s eyes on me, I was able to get God’s eyes on other people.
I began to have more compassion and empathy for others. I desired more and more to share with people how much God loves them, and desires a deep personal relationship with them. I began to experience the life I was meant to live, one of deep friendship with God and others, being fully known and fully loved — and inviting others into this life of true fulfillment.
Which steps will you implement in your life this week, as you ask Jesus to grow you?
At the cross, Jesus overcame all shame. Period. Now, it’s only a matter of living into what is true. Take these steps as you ask Jesus to bring healing and freedom from shame. You’ll be freed up to experience a life of maximum satisfaction, because you’ll be living in your true value. You’ll encounter deeper love with God, self, and others.
God desires for you to see Him as He truly is, so that you can see yourself as He sees you, and others as He sees them. #loved # yourvalue #noshame
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April 21, 2019
5 Attributes of God: Viewing God Correctly
God lives up to His promises because His character never changes. His faithfulnesses, as the Bible reminds us, is immeasurable.
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Why is it important that we view God as He really is?
A.W. Tozer, in his classic book, The Knowledge of the Holy, puts it this way: “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”
What does Tozer mean by this? He means that if we are to truly experience the life-changing power of Christianity, we must hold the correct view that God is all-powerful, sovereign, holy, just, and merciful. Adds Tozer: “Man’s spiritual history will positively demonstrate that no religion has ever been greater than its idea of God. Worship is pure or base as the worshipper entertains high or low thoughts of God.”
God has shared numerous attributes about Himself, so that we can correctly view Him within the limited capacity of our puny human brains.
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Can We Really Know God?
How do we know what God is like? The Bible. The Bible is full of details on what’s important to God. In broad strokes it tells us what He loves (us!), and what He hates (sin). It gets nitty gritty on His guidelines for how we are to love and forgive others, and His stance on stealing, coveting, and killing. It tells us how to battle our pride. It even leaves us with no doubt as to His views on some of our biggest societal issues, including porn, abortion, and homelessness.
Quick question: Do you entertain “high” or “low” thoughts about God? Do you know Him as your Creator — or more as a cosmic genie? Do you have a daily relationship with God — or do you seek Him out only when you have a problem?
Let’s look at five attributes of God’s nature. Each of them points us to seeing God correctly: as good, gracious, and reliable. He is who He is, not who we try to make Him into. God loves us fiercely, but His justice is as concrete as His love.
God is All-Powerful
“O Sovereign LORD! You have made the heavens and earth by Your great power. Nothing is too hard for You!” (Jeremiah 32:17)
God enjoys unlimited power; absolutely nothing is too hard for Him. God can simply speak something into existence! Everything God wants to happen, will happen; nothing can thwart or prevent His plans. God even has power over life and death. None can challenge Him or His plans. Because God is good, His power reflects His good character. We can trust that God not only holds this crazy world in the palm of His hand — but our individuals hurts and fears and needs as well. We serve a BIG God.
Notes Tozer: “God knows instantly and effortlessly all matter and all matters, all mind and every mind, all spirit and all spirits, all being and every being, all creaturehood and all creatures, every plurality and all pluralities, all law and every law, all relations, all causes, all thoughts, all mysteries, all enigmas, all feeling, all desires, every unuttered secret, all thrones and dominions, all personalities, all things visible and invisible in heaven and in earth, motion, space, time, life, death, good, evil, heaven, and hell.”
God is all-powerful because He is sovereign.
God is Sovereign
“All the people of the earth are nothing compared to Him. He has the power to do as He pleases among the angels of heaven and with those who live on earth. No one can stop Him or challenge Him, saying, ‘What do You mean by doing these things?’” (Daniel 4:35)
God is self-sufficient and self-sustaining. He has no need of anything, including us. Yet He finds it a good thing to work through us to accomplish His master plan. So why are we too often guilty of trying to define God, stuffing Him inside a box we label and think we control? As if! Let’s not kid ourselves. God has dominion over all, including our life and death. God’s power diminishes any we think we have!
“Left to ourselves we tend immediately to reduce God to manageable terms,” notes Tozer. “We want to get Him where we can use Him, or at least know where He is when we need Him. We want a God we can in some measure control.”
God is sovereign because He is completely holy and just.
God is Holy and Just
I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.” (Isaiah 46:9-10)
God is perfect. Thus His holy presence demands that He reject our sin. But because He loves us so fiercely, He sacrificed Himself on the cross so that we can stand in right relationship with Him. Think about that: only God’s holiness could cover the filth of our sin. But just as He fights for us, God will turn His back on us if we refuse to give up our sin. Because God respects our free will, He leaves the choice entirely up to us. Now that’s a gracious God!
“Justice is not something God has,” notes Tozer. “Justice is something that God is.”
Because God is holy, He is pure love.
God is Loving
“ And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from His love, Death can’t, and life can’t. The angels can’t, and the demons can’t. Our fears for today, our worries about tomorrow, and even the powers of hell can not keep God’s love away. Whether we are high above the sky or in the deepest ocean, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35, 37-39)
God’s goodness stems from His loving nature. Not even our gravest sin minimizes God’s love for us! As Joyce Meyer frequently says, God separates our “who” from our “do.” We may have bad moments, but that doesn’t make us bad people in God’s eyes. Isn’t that amazing?! He instantly forgives us when we ask, and remembers our sin no more. He hears even our softest whisper of remorse!
“We need never shout across the spaces to an absent God,” notes Tozer. “He is nearer than our own soul, closer than our most secret thoughts.”
Because God is fully loving, He extends unmeasured mercy.
God is Merciful
“The LORD is gracious and merciful; Slow to anger and great in lovingkindness.” (Psalm 145:8)
God is omniscient; He knows the past, present, and future. He knows every thought and word and action we’ll take today, tomorrow, even next year. Yet He has promised to “never relent from showing mercy to His children.” Thus, he administers His justice to us fairly. God listens to our pleas for mercy, and washes away our transgressions.
“As judgment is God’s justice confronting moral inequity,” adds Tozer, “so mercy is the goodness of God confronting human suffering and guilt. Were there no guilt in the world, no pain and no tears, God would yet be infinitely merciful; but His mercy might well remain hidden in His heart, unknown to the created universe. No voice would be raised to celebrate the mercy of which none felt the need. It is human misery and sin that call forth the divine mercy.”
God promises to never relent from showing His mercy to us. It is instantly given, when we confess our sins. As a society, however, we have decided we don’t need mercy. Because, we’ve decided, that a loving, merciful God won’t eventually punish us by casting us from His presence. Tozer puts it like this: “The vague and tenuous hope that God is too kind to punish the ungodly, has become a deadly opiate for the consciences of millions.”
God is Who God Is, Not Who We Say He Is
The truth, of course, is just the opposite. God is who He is, not as we try to mold Him into being. He makes the rules, we don’t. That sounds harsh, until we finally begin to understand His utterly holy and just character.
So, we have a choice: accept and follow Him as He is, to eternally remain in His precious presence. Or refuse to love and follow God, and miss out. I personally can’t wait to be overwhelmed by the majesty and glory of God.
This Tozer quote is utterly fab:
“O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, so that I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, ‘Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away.’ Then give me grace to rise and follow Thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long.”
Study the attributes above, until you begin to get a solid, truthful view of who God is. He’s kinda irresistible once you open your heart and brain to all that He is!
In our next blog post, let’s pay homage to great moms everywhere, by looking at how they reflect God’s love!
Catch up: The introductory post to this series.
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Your Identity: Are You a “Worthless Sinner”?
Throughout my years in ministry, I’ve known many missionaries, college students, men, and women who also view themselves this way, whether consciously or subconsciously. Perhaps you default to holding a similar view? That, at a conscious level, you believe you have little to no value? That there’s something inherently wrong with who you are? That you’ll never fit in, and never measure up? That you’re a failure? And that God agrees, seeing no more value in you than the trash you threw out last night?
Even if you don’t consciously hold these views about yourself, they might still operate in your life on a subconscious level. Because throughout life, especially in our early years, we look to people’s actions and words to define our value.
Have you been bullied or rejected by others? Have you experienced conditional acceptance — gaining the approval of others only when you “performed” as they wanted you to? Perhaps you felt the rejection of a sibling who was constantly annoyed with you, or a parent who was physically or emotionally absent. Or, perhaps, as you were growing up, you weren’t allowed to express your opinions or they were belittled.
All of these scenarios, intentional or not, can communicate that we lack value, leading us to develop negative core beliefs about our worth. This, in a word, is shame–believing “I am bad” or that “something is wrong with who I am.”
Your Self-Image Is Revealed Through Your Actions
We reveal what we believe about ourselves through our thoughts and actions. Do you find yourself procrastinating on tasks, or getting overwhelmed and dreading failure? Do you find yourself getting angry when someone disagrees with, rejects, or embarrasses you? Do you fear conflict, or find yourself trying to make others happy and doing whatever it takes to “keep the peace”?
These reactions reveal negative core beliefs you hold about your worth, otherwise known as low self-worth or low self-esteem. If we’re honest, most of us would admit to struggling with our self-esteem to some extent. If we truly believed we are of great value, we would be steadfast in who we were created to be. We wouldn’t struggle so heavily with these scenarios that reveal our fears, anger, and ways of attempting to manage our value. So, is the solution to just try to develop better self-esteem?
Pop psychology tells us to just believe in ourselves; to essentially just try harder to think positively about ourselves. But there’s a significant problem with this method. What we desperately need is an objective and universal standard of value from an outside source, not a subjective source such as people’s opinions or even our own.
Your True Value
The solution to our struggle of knowing and accepting our worth comes from seeing ourselves as God sees us.
We need to truly believe, deep down in our heart, who God says we are. To live out of new core beliefs that change the way we think, behave, and operate. To know who we are as image bearers of God. To truly believe He specifically made each and every one of us to be unique. It’s why we all have different personalities, gifts, and talents (Psalm 139:13-14).
We are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), meaning that we, unlike animals or other aspects of creation, are given distinct dignity and value. The very breath of God breathed life into us, as human beings (Genesis 2:7). God created us and said, “It is very good” (Genesis 1:31). The entire earth has been entrusted to us to rule and reign over (Genesis 1:28).
When mankind chose to sin and turn away from God, the first thing God did was come after us to restore the broken relationship (Genesis 3:9). Our turning away from God never changed our worth or God’s love for us. Once sin entered the world and we were born sinful by nature (Psalm 51:5), we never ceased to be created in the image of God (Genesis 9:6). Our inherent value never changed. Amazing!
I love how Psalm 17:8 expresses God’s love and affection toward us. It says, “Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings.” At face value, that may not seem to carry much weight. But the Hebrew word for “apple” literally means “little man.” When you stand close enough to someone, you see a tiny reflection of yourself in their pupils. You see yourself as the “apple” of their eyes. In this Psalm, David is saying this is who you are to God. You are the little man reflected in God’s eyes.
You are always in His vision. You are always the object of his affection and obsession. This is how much you are loved and valued.
God Doesn’t Merely Tolerate You
Jesus didn’t go to the cross to be tortured, die, and defeat death for the sake of trash. In love, He went to the cross to redeem and restore a relationship that was lost. One of the most well-known verses in Scripture says it plainly, in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that He sent His only son…” God doesn’t merely tolerate or love you as a result of Christ’s work on the cross. Rather, His love was the fuel for Christ’s work. Whether or not we choose to follow Christ, God has radical love for us and deems us to be of great value.
When we seek forgiveness and reconciliation with God, we experience the thriving life we were meant to live. One of knowing God deeply and being known by Him. As a result of Jesus’ work on the cross, we are adopted into His family (Ephesians 1:5), approved of and accepted (Romans 15:7), made right in God’s eyes and blameless (Romans 3:28), becoming an indispensable part of His kingdom work (1 Corinthians 12:22).
Let this truth sink into your soul: God the Father's love for you, as His child, is as great as His love for Jesus.
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We see this clearly when Jesus prayed to God the Father saying, “You sent me and loved them even as you loved me” (John 17:23b). What an amazing reality!
Living Out the Worth God Has Already Assigned Us
Think about this: If we could get value from our performance, then Jesus died in vain.
Performance is the essence of man-made religion, which teaches us to “do good” in an attempt to be loved by God. But what Christianity teaches is that since we are already loved by God, we do good as a result. We don’t do good in order to earn God’s love, we do good in response to His amazing love. Attempting to perform to get our worth from others will always end in futility.
Jesus’ whole mission on earth was to live the perfect life that we could never live, fully obeying God the Father, and then die, taking the punishment and separation from God that we deserve as a result of our turning from God. Jesus already received the approval of God for us. It is done. Through Jesus, we can be fully loved and fully approved of by God.
It is essential that we grasp the value God says we have. Because what we truly believe dictates how we live, love, and interact with God and others.
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Seek Him. He Loves You. You Were Made For This.
If you’re a Christian, rest in your value as an image-bearer, and your identity as a son or daughter adopted into His family. Dwell on who God says you are and how much He values you. You’re not defined by what you’ve done to yourself or others. And you’re definitely not defined by what’s been done to you.
You’re defined ONLY by the value and identity God gives you. Meditate on times in your life where you have felt His love and experienced His acceptance.
If you’re not yet a follower of Jesus, you need to know God loves you, unconditionally, just as you are, and desires so much to be known by you. At this very moment, in fact, He is offering you an invitation to enter into a personal relationship with Him. He wants you to experience the depth of His love, to know and live into your purpose, and to experience His forgiveness. As 1 Timothy 2:4 says, God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
In the next post I share five steps that helped me overcome shame and my negative self-image. It will encourage you in practical ways to implement the truths of this post.
For more on knowing God personally, check out this really good info.
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April 20, 2019
Three Ways the Resurrection of Jesus Can Transform Your Life Today
Original post by Sean McDowell here. Used with permission.
Some of the greatest skeptics have been convinced by the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus. These include literary geniuses (C.S. Lewis), lawyers (Simon Greenleaf), cold case detectives (J. Warner Wallace), historians (Will Durant), journalists (Lee Strobel) and many more.
As my father and I demonstrate in the updated Evidence that Demands A Verdict, the historical evidence for the resurrection is remarkable enough to persuade some of the greatest minds in history.
And yet the resurrection of Jesus is not merely a historical event from 2,000 years ago. The truth of the resurrection has power for your life today (Philippians 3:10).
Consider three examples:
1. The Resurrection Offers Answers for Doubters.
Doubt is not a sin. Even some of the apostles of Jesus doubted at his ascension (Matthew 28:17). Jude encourages us to be merciful towards those who doubt (1:22). I went through a period of significant doubt in my early twenties, and the evidence for the resurrection was significant in helping me maintain my faith. Part of what motivated Dr. Michael Licona to research and write his massive book on the resurrection, The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach, was to find answers to his own doubts. Knowing and experiencing the truth of the resurrection can help Christians who doubt.
2. The Resurrection Offers Hope for Grievers.
Like taxes, death is inevitable. We have all lost loved ones. As Christians, the resurrection offers us hope in our grief. The Apostle Paul writes:
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep.
For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
3. The Resurrection Offers Forgiveness for Sinners.
Guilt is a universal human experience. Naturalists try to explain it away as a vestige of Darwinian evolution. It is a trick, some claim, to get us to live in peaceful relationship for the sake of propagating the species. But the Christian has a different perspective: we feel guilty because we areguilty. Guilt is not illusory. We have wronged God, and we have wronged other human beings. The solution is not to deny the reality of guilt, or to rely upon human effort, but to embrace the forgiveness only Jesus offers. The Apostle Peter said:
The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. (Acts 5:30-31)
The resurrection offers answers for doubters, hope for grievers, and forgiveness for sinners. If you are not a Christian, will you at least consider the evidence for the resurrection? You just might be surprised by its strength, but more importantly, how that truth can transform your life today.
Sean McDowell, Ph.D. is a professor of Christian Apologetics at Biola University, best-selling author, popular speaker, part-time high school teacher, and the Resident Scholar for Summit Ministries, California. Follow him on Twitter: @sean_mcdowell and his blog: seanmcdowell.org.
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April 16, 2019
Why a Jigsaw Guide to Life?
Why a Jigsaw Guide to Life?
Well, it’s not too difficult to look at life like a giant jigsaw puzzle. The biggest puzzle of them all. This world is broken. Life is confusing. We’re surrounded by all these pieces and we’re not sure what to do with them.
I grew up with many people who could look at life like a broken puzzle, and they knew we’d never find all the pieces. They knew we’d never find all the answers. The trouble was many stopped asking the questions.
If we look at life like a broken jigsaw puzzle there is hope!
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But if we look at life like a broken jigsaw puzzle there is hope, because when it comes to a jigsaw puzzle you don’t need every single piece of a puzzle in place to see the big picture. You don’t need to know everything to know the truth.
This is where it starts to get exciting. All those ultimate questions that were beyond reach may be within reach.
Where did we come from?
Why are we here?
Where are we going?
Questions that many people have dismissed and thought, “there’s no point asking those questions. We’ll never find all the answers!” The jigsaw reminds us, we can start snapping things into place.
It’s great to know that God wants us to know the truth.
He has made pieces of the puzzle visible, within reach, available to us. When we start to look at things that stand out and fit them together, we can start to see the big picture.
A Jigsaw Guide to Life reminds us that we can look at life with hope, knowing you don’t need every piece of a puzzle to see the big picture, you don’t need to know everything to know the truth.
Question.
Knowing that life is about being discoverable, what is your purpose?
Not just your purpose, but what is the purpose to life?
READ Alex’s blog on purpose here.
Have you been Journeying Together with us?
Catch up: The introductory post to this series. Next week’s post we will look forward to learning more about Christ’s divinity in our upcoming posts. Knowing this will change our lives!
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April 14, 2019
3 Foundational Truths of Christianity
What do Christians basically believe?
For starters, that God has a wonderful plan for humanity — though Adam and Eve mucked up the works pretty darn fast. Were the actions of these infamous first sinners a surprise to God? No. Because in creating us, God intentionally gave us free will. Just like He gave Satan. Despite knowing that we, too, would all too often choose sin over Him, God allows us the freedom to choose. God isn’t interested in robots, but messy people who sincerely love Him.
Amazingly, God continually seeks to bring us back into right standing with Him. That’s true tolerance!
Let’s look at three foundational truths that committed Christ-followers find compelling enough to exclude all paths except Jesus.
Foundational Truth #1: Jesus Proved His Deity
During his 3-year ministry, Jesus repeatedly told His followers that He came from heaven to die for mankind’s sin, in order to reconcile us to God. In dying and resurrecting, Jesus fulfilled numerous Old Testament prophesies uttered hundreds of years before His birth.
But Jesus knows that talk can be cheap. So how did He make good on His claims? Through His actions.
Did Jesus demonstrate compassion, kindness, and acceptance? Yup! Jesus called out sin, but He foremost made it clear that He was motivated by the love that God the Father has for every single one of us. Did Jesus demonstrate incredible wisdom? Off the charts! He left even the most educated stumped. Did Jesus demonstrate miraculous power over nature, disease, demons, and death? Totally! Even over His own death, which validates His claim of the being the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
Everything Jesus said AND did were congruent. Everything about Him, as I heard one scholar put it, “Hangs together.” It may still take quite the leap of faith for some of us to believe that God would come down in human form. But Jesus could NOT have done more to relationally prove God’s love.
Externally, Jesus appeared to be just a first-century Palestine peasant. But He proved His deity with His actions. Who can this be, asked His wowed disciples, that even the wind and sea obey Him?
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Foundational Truth #2: Christianity Changes People
The Bible clearly says that humanity’s woes stem from our collective sinful nature. Even our modern technology can’t save us from ourselves. Just look at the online porn footprint, which has become a multi-billion dollar industry. Despite the societal view that modern man has become “enlightened” by leaving God behind, we just can’t get beyond the pull of addiction, abuse, hatred, revenge, and other crippling, destructive behaviors.
Many people actually are looking for a “savior” — but they’re placing bets on the wrong ponies. It won’t be government intervention or subsidies, New Age philosophies, the media, the money of the super wealthy, or even the “right” president who will be able to “fix things.” Because they can’t address the real root of the problem: Us.
As Jesus notes in the Bible, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man.”
It’s so frustrating to Christians that they don’t instantly become like Jesus the moment they accept Him as Lord. God might, of course, immediately release a person from an addiction or situation that had so painfully ensnared them. But to become the loving, patient, self-controlled person that Christ modeled, we must go through the daily (and sometimes painful) process of partnering with God to put ourselves second.
But here’s the good news: because God offers us complete assurance of His love, acceptance, and forgiveness, we can RUN to him and find His arms open to us every time we mess up. We need that grace so much!
Foundational Truth #3: The Bible is Historical Reliable
The Bible is God’s Word to us. It’s very cool that God not only cares about the issues we’re struggling with, but that in His Word He provides answers to many of our questions about life and purpose. To critics who suggest that the Bible is outdated, irrelevant, and in no way applicable to modern society, I’d have to ask if they’ve actually read much of it. The Bible teaches us how to love, how to forgive, where to place our focus, even how to be great spouses, friends, and parents.
The Bible’s integrity, specific to both its historical and geographical record, continues to be supported by external sources and archeological discoveries. Critics like to claim that the Bible can’t be trusted due to the element of human error. But this just isn’t true. We have lots of blog posts that cover the reliability of Scripture that you can peruse. Just one notable confirmation of the authenticity of the Bible can be found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, which were discovered in a cave in Qumran only about 70 years ago.
Jesus fulfilled loads of Old Testament prophesy through His birth, death, and resurrection. Even today, the Bible continues to provide convincing prophetic accuracy. The Bible isn’t an ordinary, static book. It contains the Spirit of God!
“I’m just not sure that I can make the leap that Jesus is God. Or that He really cares about me.”
I totally get this! Because I had to overcome these mental hurdles, too. I hated that Christ died such a gruesome death; it took me years to gratefully accept that Jesus purposefully, willingly chose to hang there to express God‘s ceaseless love for ME. Because of that sacrifice — not my actions — I am deemed worthy to enter God’s presence without shame or guilt. That’s mind-blowing!
When Jesus said, “I am the Way,” he meant it. It wasn’t small talk, it wasn’t bragging, it was truth.
Where else, in all of existence, can we find a restorative relationship based not on our do, but on our who? Show me! Among all world religions, ONLY Christianity offers grace and full acceptance of our messy insides — even if they resemble that ghastly Dorian Gray’s portrait. #yowza
The foundational truths of Christianity are based on the historical personage of Jesus. He lived, He died, and He resurrected, to intimately show us God’s amazing power and love. But the choice is up to us: Will we accept that we are so valued and wanted by the Creator of the universe?
Only through Christ can we receive the free gift of unconditional acceptance and love that we instinctively crave. This makes Christianity completely unique, and completely cool.
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In our next blog post, let’s look at five attributes of God. Wanna know God better? Don’t miss that post!
Catch up: The introductory post to this series.
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April 13, 2019
What Makes the Bible So Special? Quick VIDEO
Original post by Sean McDowell here. Used with permission.
Sean McDowell, Ph.D. is a professor of Christian Apologetics at Biola University, best-selling author, popular speaker, part-time high school teacher, and the Resident Scholar for Summit Ministries, California. Follow him on Twitter: @sean_mcdowell and his blog: seanmcdowell.org.
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April 7, 2019
Why Did Jesus Have to Die?
Here’s why the “Why did Jesus have to die?” question is critical: if you and I don’t get clear on the need for Jesus’ cruel death on the cross, we’ll never fully grasp the full nature of God. And we’ll cheapen the significance of the cross — which I’ll admit I did for a whole lot of years. People, I was 100 percent disgusted by the cross. I hated seeing it in church. I hated hearing about it in church. And there was no way I was wearing a shiny gold replica of it around my neck! As a child I can remember thinking, “The cross is seriously yucky. Poor grown-up baby Jesus!”
I was so focused on pitying Jesus, that for years I was mad at God. What kind of loving God, I asked, would send His son to endure torture and death? But my question only showed my cluelessness about God's supreme goodness.
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“Why did Jesus have to die?” Let’s look at two important reasons!
Why Did Jesus Have to Die? Because of Justice.
Why did Jesus have to die? Reason #1: So that God can welcome us into His holy presence.
Once humanity chose to sin, our sin separated us from God. Because God is completely holy. This might be hard for us to understand, so let’s use an analogy. Imagine a freshly shampooed carpet in our family playroom — and our muddy-pawed puppy racing toward it. We’d stall the puppy to prevent it from spoiling the carpet, right?
The torture that Jesus endured on the way to His death was shameful. Crucifixion, perfected under the oh-so-enlightened Romans, remains the most monstrous form of public execution ever devised. It is horrific, excruciating, and inhumane.
But when we isolate the words horrific, excruciating, and shameful, we get our first hints of the depth of sacrifice God was willing to make of Himself to reconcile us to Him.
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As a child — okay, even for a whole lot of my adult years — I missed the of Himself part. The phrase “God sent His son to die” muddies the reality that God and Jesus are one.
God wasn’t an indifferent, distant bystander. He felt every slap, punch, and lash of the whip. He felt the jarring pain in each step Jesus took to reach Golgotha. He felt the sense of suffocation Jesus experienced each time He struggled to fill His lungs on the cross. God felt the suffocating weight of our evilness and sin that draped heavy on Jesus. He felt the utter despair of Jesus’ loneliness when He turned His back on Jesus. God could have prevented the cross — but yet He couldn’t, if we were to be redeemed.
Together, at the cross, God and Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice, forever wiping the mud from our paws, so we can race, unfettered, to Them, 24/7.
Dr. Andy Bannister of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries answers the question, “Why did Jesus have to die?” this way. The cross, he explains, is the cross-section of God’s mercy and justice. When true forgiveness or mercy is bestowed, someone has to pay the price for it. The cross offers true mercy and forgiveness, but not at the expense of justice. God, through Jesus, was perfectly unselfish. He stepped up to pay the exorbitant fine required for our sin.
Notes Richard Cunningham in his excellent article on BeThinking.org, “We underestimate the significance of our sin — which is why the death of Jesus looks like gratuitous violence.” Adds Bibleinfo.com, “…a just and perfect God could not simply sweep sin under the carpet and go on running a perfect universe.”
Because we can’t see our sin the way God does, we kinda think maybe His standards are too high. Like, maybe, God should take a chill pill.
Christ's suffering was so terrible because it was equal to the seriousness of our sin.
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Here’s my prayer for all of us: that we begin to see how our sin hurts God — and that we gain the desire to truly honor Him wholeheartedly with our words, thoughts, and actions.
Why Did Jesus Have to Die? Because of Love.
Why did Jesus have to die? Reason #2: To demonstrate God’s complete and utter love for us.
Why, asks Cunningham, did Jesus so deliberately co-operate with a series of events that took Him to a place of torture and bloody execution? It seems unnecessary. Except for the point we just made in Reason #1: That God Himself was in Christ, personally dealing with the sin.
“True love has the power not to ignore hurt, but to absorb it,” wisely notes Cunningham. God and Jesus absorbed the pain of our sin and digested it. And Christ, he adds, “plumbed the depths of His own divine heart for those inner resources which alone can quench God’s righteous anger.”
The loving and the dying are related. But we tend to separate the two, and view the cross to be an extravagant, self-indulgent mistake on God’s part. (Or am I the only one who has told God so, repeatedly, before I came to understand why the cross is so necessary?)
Well, it’s a fact, Jack, that the disciples certainly initially thought the cross was the end of things. But after seeing Jesus resurrected, they came to realize that the cross — not the resurrection — signified Jesus’ most victorious moment of glory. John 19:30 tells us that in nearing His death, Jesus shouts, “It is finished,” not “I am finished.” Translated correctly, the word Jesus used translates to “completed.”
At the cross, His disciples viewed Jesus as defeated. They didn't get it -- until they did! Soon they were preaching that Jesus defeated sin and death and hell itself.
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Why did Jesus have to die? For us to clearly see God’s commitment to be in relationship with us.
Why did Jesus have to die on the cross? I think Bibleinfo.com’s view is spot on: “The cross is graphic enough to reach the most hardened criminal, but also the most sensitive humanist.” Jesus was willing to die brutally for us, to prevent our brutal punishment.
Have you accepted Christ as Lord? The expiration date on His loving invitation ceases only upon your last breath. But why wait? Life, walked daily with Him, is so much better than walking alone.
In our next blog post, let’s look at some of the foundations of the Christian faith. Christianity is based on truth!
Catch up: The introductory post to this series.
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