my way or Your way

If you believe what you like in the gospels, and reject what you don't like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself.

- attributed to St Augustine on Twitter

Memorizing Bible Verses...again

I say 'again', 'cause I tend to go through phases where I'm superamped and superkeen to memorize Bible verses. However, I tend to get overexcited and put pressure on myself to learn a new one every few days, and then give up after a while because the pace is too much. So now I'm just learning a new one every week :) So far so good! It's a much more realistic tempo, and I've already learned Phil 4:4-7, Heb 13:5 and Romans 12:12.

Reading about Jesus' response to Satan after spending the 40 days in the desert was a great inspiration for my new enthusiasm: struck by Jesus' quotation of God's word to fight off the devil, I suddenly wondered what I use to combat ungodly thought?!?! The only things I kinda know off by heart are random movie quotes, and I have a funny feeling that Satan wouldn't be frightened off by: "You talkin' to me?!" or "I just know, before this is over, I'm gonna need a whole lot of serious therapy. Look at my eye twitchin'."

heehee.. that's actually quite an amusing thought.. Throwing movie quotes at Satan...

PS the quotes come from "Taxi Driver" and "Shrek".

God converts,

not me.

But this is something I had been forgetting in many of my chats with my non-Christian friends. There are two people in particular that I often walk away frustrated from because sometimes I can't answer their arguments, and at other times when I do, they just seem to refuse to accept it.

However, I was reminded of God's irreplaceable role in evangelism when a visiting preacher at our church used a Bible verse to show that the Bible is God's Word. "Hold on," I asked him afterwards, "isn't that a bit of a circular argument?!?!?!? If I wanted to start a cult and wrote a book, of course I would say it's the Word of God!"

To my complete surprise, the minister agreed. But then he pointed out that that's why God has to change your heart to see that the Bible is really His word. This is not saying that we need to throw out our brains- even though the argument for the authority of the Bible might be circular ("The Bible is the Word of God because it says it is the Word of God"), there are many intersections it makes with the real world, and it does stand up to rational investigation. However, this doesn't mean that rational arguments will convince anyone - it is the work of God to ultimately convince.

For those who are now getting worried about the authority of the Bible being based on a circular argument, another minister I asked this same question pointed out that there are many other things in life based on circular arguments. (Which didn't really comfort me that much more). But then he added that you can then check out other claims that the Bible makes e.g. internal consistency - the OT prophecies certain claims which the NT records as having been fulfilled etc.

Now I'm tired of typing, so you (i.e. The Sultan of Sound, quite possibly my one and only reader) can come up with some more.

PS I'm trying to think of other circular arguments and thought that love might be a good example? You should believe I love you because I say I love you. But then this is observable in tangible forms e.g. the way I treat you. Make sense? Not so much?

How are you treating your Bible?!?!

I popped in at a Christian conference during the holidays, and man I was rebuked!

After a few weeks of not reading my bible, the last thing I wanted to hear was : “The way you treat the Bible is a reflection of the way you treat God”. But of course, that was the very thing I needed to hear!

Add to that a reminder from Romans 12 that we are called to "no longer conform to the pattern of the world, but instead to be transformed through the renewing of your mind.." And how do you renew your mind? By immersing it in God’s Word and reflecting and thinking about it! And I know for myself that if I haven’t read the Bible for a time I certainly have no inclination to really fight sin and live life God’s way..

God’s Word is powerful and life-transforming, so why aren’t we treating it as the most precious thing we own?!?!?

Varying details in the gospels... Eeek!??

One of my friends asked me the other day about the seemingly problematic discrepancies in detail between the various gospels.

I say "seemingly-problematic" though, as many historicists credit the varying differences in the gospels as ADDING to their believability as eyewitness accounts. If they had been exactly the same, that's when you should start wondering if the authors had gotten together and decided to conspire together on what to write.

Think of any event for yourself- you'll get at least one slightly different account for every person who saw it! The fact that there are so many minor aspects which differ, don't take away from the gospels as truth- they lend authenticity to the accounts as eyewitness accounts.

Having said that, the points on which they differ aren't major points- so what if there was one angel or two angels? What is important is that the key points remain the same - Jesus rose again and was seen in real life!