Jesus’ resurrection and belief in Jesus’ deity

Only the resurrection of Jesus from the dead can explain why Christians believed Jesus was divine.  It also gives credence to the fact that Jesus claimed to be God.

Many skeptics think that Jesus never made claims to deity – that such claims were merely put on his lips by his followers.  But why would they do so?  The Jews had no concept of a divine messiah.  Indeed, the idea that God could become a human being was considered blasphemy to the Jews.  If the gospels are to be believed, the reason Jesus was condemned to death by the Jews was precisely because he claimed to be God.

 

Tactical response to the “no one knows when life begins” objection

When someone supports abortion on the basis that “nobody knows when life begins,” my immediate reaction is to immediately correct their misinformation with the facts of biology.  Doing so, however, does not always end up with them becoming pro-life.  People will often move the goalpost, offering another justification for abortion.

To prevent this, you could ask: “Does this mean that if we knew when life began – and we found that it began at conception – that you join me in opposing abortions?”  If they say yes, then they commit themselves to becoming pro-life once you have provided them with the biological evidence.  Of course, they could always say no, in which case you might ask them, “If it’s not our ignorance of when life begins that justifies abortion, then what does?”  While this may prevent you from being able to provide them with the biological evidence to demonstrate their error, at least it will refocus the conversation to the reason(s) they think justifies abortion – which allows you to be more pointed in your apologetic, and provides a better chance of them changing their mind.

 

Can’t sell berries if you believe in natural marriage

A farmer got evicted from a city farmers’ market because he does not permit same-sex couples to get married on his farm.  Violate your convictions or be punished.

 

Taiwan approves same-sex marriage

On May 24 Taiwan’s constitutional court ruled that same-sex couples ought to have access to the institution of marriage, and gave the legislature two years to amend the civil code. They are the first Asian nation to adopt same-sex marriage.

 

Something must be eternal

A simple reflection tells us that something must be eternal.  After all, if you start with nothing, you’ll always end up with nothing.  But we ended up with something, which means we must have started with something.  Put another way, since something exists now something must have always existed.  There could never be a time when absolutely nothing existed.  Something must be eternal, but what is that something?

There are good scientific and philosophical reasons to conclude that physical reality has not always existed, so physical reality can’t be the eternal something.  Since things which begin to exist must be caused to exist by something else, physical reality had to be caused by something else, and perhaps the cause of the physical world is the eternal something we are looking for.  How would we know?

 

Don’t turn Adam and Eve into a society just yet: Evaluating the science behind the original human population size

Could the human population have originated from two people? Many say science has proven this to be impossible and are reinterpreting the Biblical narrative to fit the current scientific thinking.  In this article, Fuz Rana evaluates the science behind the claims regarding original human population sizes. He notes that it is based on mathematical modeling rather than empirical data, and those mathematical models have failed verification in each case we have been able to test them.  At the very least this ought to give Christians pause before reinterpreting the Bible to fit the latest scientific thinking.  It would be foolish to abandon the historicity of a primordial pair of humans based on scientific reasoning that has inaccurately “predicted” the original population sizes of animals for which we know the original populations.  If the mathematics are too idealized for real-life biology, then Christians should not feel the pressure to “revise” our theology.

 

What I’ve Been Reading: The Resurrection of Jesus

Michael Licona’s magnum opus on the resurrection, The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach, is a must read for those who are interested in the historical evidence for the resurrection.  It has some overlap with other great works on the resurrection such as N. T. Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God, but it is distinct in that it begins with an examination of history and method (philosophy of history) before examining the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus and drawing any conclusions.  Licona explores the nature of historical knowledge (what can be known) and historical methodology.  He even assesses the source material (canonical as well as non-canonical material) to determine each source’s value for the investigation.  Finally, he gets to the heart of the matter by determining the historical facts, and then assessing competing hypotheses to determine the best explanation.  All 600+ pages are worth your attention!