Mini Posts: Excerpts, Quotations & Random Thoughts

Natasha Crain, writer

https://crossexamined.org/how-mainstream-media-gaslights-christians-and-everyone-else-who-disagrees-with-them/

“…it’s estimated that only 6 percent of Americans have a biblical worldview (accepting core teachings of the Bible). Yes, 65 percent of Americans identify themselves with the label “Christian,” but the vast majority of self-identified Christians hold beliefs in conflict with basic biblical teachings about things such as the existence of objective morality, the reality of heaven and hell, the nature of God, and much more.

If you’re in the 6 percent whose worldview is based on what the Bible teaches, you’re going to feel the pressure of seeing that nearly everyone in culture—including those who identify as a Christian—thinks differently. And media wants to capitalize on that aspect of our humanity that makes us question our beliefs just because they differ from the norm. But remember: There’s no such thing as democracy when it comes to what’s true about reality; numbers will never determine truth.”

William Lane Craig

https://www.reasonablefaith.org/william-lane-craig

“Something is objective if it’s real or independent of anyone’s opinion about it. ‘Water is H20’ is an objective fact.

Something is subjective if it’s just a matter of personal opinion. ‘Vanilla tastes better than chocolate’ is subjective.

You can keep these terms straight by remembering that ‘objective is like an object that is really there, whereas ‘subjective’ is like a subject or a person on whose opinion something depends.”

Christian philosopher Norman Geisler summary of his basic apologetics stance:

1) Truth about reality is knowable
2) The opposite of true is false
3) It is true that a theistic God exists
4) If God exists then miracles are possible
5) A miracle confirms a message from God
6) The New Testament is historically reliable
7) The New Testament says Jesus claimed to be God
8) Jesus’ claim to be God was miraculously confirmed
9) Jesus is God
10) Whatever Jesus teaches is true
11) Jesus taught that the Bible is the Word of God
12) Therefore, the Bible is the Word of God

Lyrics from “How Great Thou Art”

O Lord, my God, when I in awesome wonder
Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder
Thy power throughout the universe displayed
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art, how great Thou art
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art, how great Thou art
And when I think of God, His Son not sparing
Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in
That on the Cross, my burden gladly bearing
He bled and died to take away my sin
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art, how great Thou art
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee H
ow great Thou art, how great Thou art
When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation
And lead me home, what joy shall fill my heart
Then I shall bow with humble adoration
And then proclaim, my God, how great Thou art
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art, how great Thou art
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art, how great Thou art

Argument for God from Being

  1. Something exists (e.g.; I do)

  2. Nothing cannot produce something

  3. Therefore, something exists eternally and necessarily

    1. (a) It exists eternally because if ever there was absolutely nothing, then there would always be absolutely nothing because nothing cannot produce something.

    2. (b) It exists necessarily because everything cannot be a contingent being because all contingent beings need a cause of their existence.

  4. I am not a necessary and eternal being ( I change)

  5. Therefore, both God (a Necessary Being) and I (a contingent being) exist (= theism)

    Norman Geisler, page 216 of “Twelve Points That Show Christianity is True”

Darwin’s Flaw

“Living things contain immense and irreducible complexity that cannot be accounted for by the mechanism that Darwin proposed. Natural selection is supposed to proceed by undirected small modifications, one bit at a time, but the living cell has turned out to be a maze of molecular machine, in many of which the parts interact in such a way that unless all of them are present at once, the machine either doesn’t work right or doesn’t work at all. There could be no selective advantage in having one part, or two parts, or three, because these machines do not function at all until their assembly is complete. Darwin wrote that ‘if it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.’ By his own criterion, then, his theory has absolutely broken down.”

- J. Budziszewski, from his book, “What We Can’t Not Know.”