Gregory Koukl's Blog, page 3

Links Mentioned on the 8/24/16 Show

The following is a rundown of today's podcast, annotated with links that were either mentioned on the show or inspired by it:

Commentary: Justin Brierley from the "Unbelievable?" Podcast (0:00)

Justin Brierley from Premier Christian Radio
"Unbelievable?" podcast
Greg's most recent appearance on "Unbelievable?"
"Unbelievable?" show archives
Episodes with Jay Smith
Lawrence Krauss vs. John Lennox: Science, the Universe, and the God Question
William Lane Craig vs. Daniel Came: Does Mathematics Point to God?
"Unbelievable?" Live Event: August 27th, Northridge, CA (Featuring a conversation between Sean McDowell and Ryan Bell)

Listen to today's show or download any archived show for free. (Find links from past shows here.)

To take part in the Twitter conversation during the live show (Tuesdays 4:00���6:00 p.m. PT), follow @STRtweets and use the hashtag #STRtalk.

Challenge: There���s a Contradiction at the Core of Christianity

This week���s challenge is about salvation by faith:

A standard part of ���becoming a Christian��� is ���accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior.��� There are a few choice scriptures which Christians use when explaining how people are saved.

John 3:16 (NIV): ���For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.���


Ephesians 2:8-9 (NIV): ���For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith���and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God���not by works, so that no one can boast.���

It���s the standard Christian dogma that people are saved simply by believing in Jesus and accepting His gift of forgiveness. However, Jesus Himself refutes this view in Matthew.

Matthew 7:21-23 (NIV): ���Not everyone who says to me, ���Lord, Lord,��� will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ���Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?��� Then I will tell them plainly, ���I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!���

So, Christians must either adopt a non-standard dogma, or admit that their belief system is wrong. This seeming contradiction within the Bible stands above others simply because it���s at the very core of the religion. Any intellectual within the religion must disbelieve the church���s teachings in order to preserve the church���s religion.

How would you explain this alleged contradiction? Give us your explanation in the comments below, and check back here on Thursday to hear Tim���s answer to this challenge.

[Explore past challenges here and here.]

Soundbite of the Week: How Many Times Should I Forgive Someone?

Greg responds to the question: How many times do I forgive someone when they continue to hurt me and have no intention of changing?

What Can���t Science Account For?

I���m helping out at CrossExamined Instructor Academy this weekend, and Frank Turek played this great two-minute clip from a discussion between William Lane Craig and Peter Atkins, wherein Craig lists five rational beliefs that can���t be scientifically proven:

Logical and mathematical truths ��� science presupposes logic and math.
Metaphysical truths ��� e.g., the idea that the external world is real.
Ethical truths ��� e.g., you can't prove by science that the Nazis were wrong to experiment on Jews.
Aesthetic truths ��� beauty can���t be scientifically proven.
Science itself ��� science can���t be justified by the scientific method.

Links Mentioned on the 8/19/16 Show

The following is a rundown of today's podcast, annotated with links that were either mentioned on the show or inspired by it:

Commentary: Is God Transgender? (0:00)

Is God Transgender? by Mark Sameth
A Rabbi Claims that God Is Transgender by Michael Brown
Slate: Don't Let the Doctor Assign a Gender to Your Newborn by Amy Hall

Questions:

��� Announcements:

reTHINK Student Apologetics Conferences ��� California (Sept. 23���24), Texas (Oct. 21���22), Alabama (Apr. 21���22, 2017)

1. Thank you for the STR cruise conference. (0:26)

STR's Facebook page

2. What���s the difference between ���oneness theology��� and the Trinity? (0:34)

The Trinity: A Solution, Not a Problem Part 1, Part 2 by Greg Koukl

3. Do we have to sin? (0:44)

3. How can I put a stone in people���s shoes about how God has used my disability? (0:52)

If God Is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil by Randy Alcorn

Listen to today's show or download any archived show for free. (Find links from past shows here.)

To take part in the Twitter conversation during the live show (Tuesdays 4:00���6:00 p.m. PT), follow @STRtweets and use the hashtag #STRtalk.

Why We Need to Learn to Die

Jesus said, ���If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.��� In Look and Live, Matt Papa explains one reason why we need to learn to die:

[B]eholding the Lord���s glory changes us to be more like Him. We become loving, joyful, peaceful.

But that���s not all���.

Becoming like Jesus is not merely about gaining greater emotional stability. It is about learning to die. It is about sacrifice for the good of others. Suffering for the joy of others. In this, God���s glory will be seen.

We behold the glory of the Lord by thinking���by meditating on the gospel���but we also behold by doing. We see the glory of the Lord through giving, serving, sharing. All of these are a means of letting our eyes adjust���.

Every time we inconvenience ourselves to achieve the happiness of someone else, we understand the love of God a little more. The cross comes into focus.

If you adopt a child, you are letting your eyes adjust to the glory of God���s Father-heart���His predestining you and adopting you into His family. You are seeing the cost He paid for your soul. How patient He was to wait for you. How helpless and alone you were and how gentle and kind He is.

If you choose to live overseas to do mission work, you are letting your eyes adjust to the glory of God���s willingness to come to our world, to make himself a stranger for your sake. You are understanding what it is to be misunderstood, to be persecuted for the sake of love and righteousness. You are beholding Glory���.

If you befriend someone who doesn���t deserve your friendship, or perhaps someone who doesn���t have very many friends, what are you doing? Beholding Glory. You are seeing the glory of the One who loved His enemies enough to bleed for them.

I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago about how a life conformed to Jesus��� humility and sacrificial love is a powerful testimony of His beauty to those who don���t know Him. Now we���re right back to that idea, with one thing added: Not only do the everyday opportunities you take to love people sacrificially show other people the glory of God, but they also reveal more of God���s glory to you.

In our culture, we���re constantly being pushed to think ���bigger��� regarding what we can do for the Kingdom, but I���m becoming more and more convicted of the need for all of us to think smaller. It���s the small act of sacrifice right in front of you today that will reveal to someone the beauty of Christ. Don���t let the opportunity pass you by.

Links Mentioned on the 8/17/16 Show

The following is a rundown of today's podcast, annotated with links that were either mentioned on the show or inspired by it:

Guest: Os Guinness Impossible People ��� How Christians Should Engage the Culture (0:00)

Os Guinness
Impossible People: Christian Courage and the Struggle for the Soul of Civilization by Os Guinness
Renaissance: The Power of the Gospel However Dark the Times by Os Guinness ��� The prequel to Impossible People (See a post on this book here.)
More books by Os Guinness
Atheism and Universal Human Rights by Amy Hall ��� Quotes from atheists that show how our culture's secular worldview will affect our view of human rights.
Transgenderism Fragments the Human Person by Amy Hall (quoting Nancy Pearcey)

Listen to today's show or download any archived show for free. (Find links from past shows here.)

To take part in the Twitter conversation during the live show (Tuesdays 4:00���6:00 p.m. PT), follow @STRtweets and use the hashtag #STRtalk.

Know Your Audience

I made a mistake. I should have known better. It���s something I���ve learned to avoid when speaking to an audience. This time, though, I didn���t pay attention. Perhaps I got comfortable, lazy, and sloppy. I didn���t follow a basic public speaking rule: know your audience.

I���ve been travelling to the Middle East and speaking there for six years now. I know the importance of adapting my material, modifying my jokes, and finding relevant illustrations. Perhaps, though, that���s exactly why I made the mistake. I got comfortable speaking to a similar type of foreign audience and then got sloppy. It wasn���t a horrible mistake, but nonetheless a bit embarrassing.

I was asked to teach on the problem of evil to an Egyptian audience outside of Cairo, Egypt. It was my first time teaching this material in Egypt and, in the interest of time, I planned to just adapt my material on the fly. Most of the presentation went well. I addressed how God and evil can both exist, where most evil comes from, why God might allow evil, and what His plans are to destroy evil one day.

It was my final comments that got me into trouble. I wanted to answer what God is currently doing about evil. I explained that God has given humanity three institutions to mitigate the impact of evil in this world: the family, the church, and the government.

The family is the fundamental unity of society. It civilizes men, protects women, and produces a healthy environment to raise and nurture healthy children. That���s why when families disintegrate through death, divorce, or other things, then people are hurt.

God has also given us the Church. Christians are responsible for rescuing and repairing a broken world. I don���t mean it���s their sole responsibility or they���re the only ones who do anything to help. The Church, though, is called to care for the poor and homeless, to serve the widow, and to protect children and orphans. Christians have often built hospitals around the world, started schools, and fought to abolish slavery.

Finally, I told them God has given the institution of the government, whose chief responsibility is justice. The government is supposed to protect innocent people and punish evildoers (Romans 13:1-4, 1 Peter 2:13-14). When government fails to do its job, evil flourishes.

Maybe you can see the problem. Apparently, I didn���t see it when those words tumbled out of my mouth. My Egyptian brothers and sisters, though, kindly helped me to see why my point didn���t make a lot of sense.

In Egypt, they told me, families aren���t healthy. Marriage doesn���t civilize men, especially Muslim men, who often treat their wives poorly. Consequently, women aren���t protected and children aren���t given a healthy environment to grow.

Churches in Egypt struggle to make a difference outside of their congregations. They���re stifled by the dominant Islamic culture and find it too difficult to repair and rescue their broken culture.

And the government? Well, that���s a joke, they told me. The Egyptian government doesn���t even have its own house in order, let alone have the ability to protect innocent people or punish evildoers. There���s been a lot of corruption within the government, and as a result, it isn���t effective at mitigating the impact of evil. Rather, it���s often a source of evil.

You can probably see why my comments fell flat. I should have known better. In fact, I knew each of the points they made about Egyptian culture. I simply forgot them when it came to my teaching material. I didn't consider my audience.

Now, are my points about the three institutions still valid? Yes, God still has given us these ways to mitigate the impact of evil. In Egypt���s case, though, there are problems with how these institutions function. What I should have done is adapt my material by stating the institutions but then explaining how they are specifically being undermined in their culture. That would have demonstrated that I knew my audience.

Well, you live and, hopefully, learn from your mistakes.

Is Oral Tradition in Islam Reliable?

Alan explains how Islamic teachings were transmitted and compiled, especially regarding the words of Mohammed.

Jesus Is Not an Egomaniac

Here���s John Piper���s take on the common objection that Jesus��� demands for love and allegiance (such as, ���Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me���) are egomaniacal:

Premise #1: Love desires and works and is willing to suffer to enthrall the beloved with the fullest and longest happiness���.

Premise #2: Being eternally enthralled with Jesus as the decisive revelation of God is the fullest and longest happiness in the universe���.

Conclusion: Therefore, when Jesus tells us that we must love him���treasure him, be satisfied in him���above all others, he is loving us���.

Here is the end of the matter: God is the one being in the universe for whom self-exaltation is not the act of a needy ego, but an act of infinite giving. The reason God seeks our supreme praise, or that Jesus seeks our supreme love, is not because he���s needy and won���t be fully God until he gets it, but because we are needy and won���t be fully happy until we give it.

This is not arrogance. This is grace.

This is not egomania. This is love.

And the very heart of the Christian gospel is that this is what Christ died to achieve���our full and everlasting enjoyment of the greatness of God.

Read or listen to the rest of Piper���s message (and for more on the objection that God is a selfish egomaniac, see here and here).

It���s important to note that usually the person making this objection is imagining how he would react if a fallen human being spoke as Jesus did. Of course any fallen human being who demanded this kind of allegiance would repulse us! But such a person repulses us precisely because he is fallen and unworthy of what he���s demanding. To begin with the assumption that Jesus is a fallen human being who is unworthy of His demands, and then to use the resulting repulsion to prove that Jesus is a fallen human being, is to engage in circular reasoning.

If one wants to evaluate the character of the Jesus of the Bible (and thus, the morality of Christian theology), then one must evaluate the Jesus of the Bible. Because of this, the question to consider is not, What would I think of a guy who demanded my love and obedience? That scenario is simply not analogous to the Christian view of Jesus; therefore, it could never lead anyone to a proper conclusion on the morality of the Christian view of Jesus. If one wants to debate the propriety of Christianity���s Jesus demanding our love, the precise question to debate is, If Jesus is God���our sovereign Creator���and is morally perfect and blindingly good and loving, then is it wrong for Him to call us to love Him above all others?