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WHY SHOULD ANYONE BELIEVE IN THE INCREDULOUS CLAIMS OF BIBLICAL CHRISTIANITY?
Realistically speaking how could any individual with even the slightest degree of commonsense be expected to believe in:
- Mysterious beings of great power who live in a kingdom beyond the stars?
- An evil fiend of darkness who can assume the form of a huge cunning serpent to deceive and destroy its victims?
- An immortal King who leaves a throne in the sky to descend to earth and live in a mortal body?
- A magical tree whose fruit is capable of imparting eternal life?
Honestly now … isn’t it true that such far out tales sound more like a fiction plot from the “Hobbit”, “Star Trek”, or “Grimm’s Fairy Tales”?
Who, in their right mind, could ever accept such bizarre concepts as being accurate accounts of real events? Yet these stories are a basic part of the fabric that makes up the Christian faith? Being absolutely candid, doesn’t it appear that to become a Christian, the very first thing you’d have to do would be to assassinate your intelligence? Certainly no person with a scientific, analytical mind could ever believe such ridiculous, unfounded claims.
OR COULD THEY?
Who would you say was the greatest scientist that ever lived? It would seem that such a question would be practically impossible to answer, yet surprising though it may be … it isn’t. Among scientists today there seems to be overwhelming agreement that only one man fits the description. Einstein? No. Hawking? No. Let’s listen as the late Isaac Asimov, one of the most prolific and well informed science writers of our time, answers that question:
"If the question were, ‘Who was the second greatest”’ it would be impossible to answer but since the question is, “Who is the greatest?” there is no problem. I feel that most historians of science would declare at once that Isaac Newton was the greatest scientific mind the world has ever seen. He founded higher mathematics by working out the calculus. He founded modern optics by his experiments on breaking up white light into the colors of the spectrum. He founded modern physics by stating the laws of motion and deducing their consequences. He founded modern astronomy by working out the law of universal gravitation.” …. After Newton’s death Alexander Pope said it all in two lines: ‘Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night, God said, "Let Newton be! And all was light."
There can be no doubt that Newton’s powers of observation, analysis, and judgment must have been incredible! Certainly no one could accuse him of being ignorant or disorganized in his thinking. Few men could match his peerless analytical mind. It will no doubt come as a shock then, to some people, to learn that this same Newton was an outspoken, fervent believer in the Bible and in Jesus Christ. On one occasion he declared, “I find more sure marks of authenticity in the Bible than in any profane (secular) history whatever.”
Nor is Newton alone in his view of the Christian faith. Many outstanding, highly intelligent people of both the past and the present have been ardent, outspoken believers of these very things! Something they discovered convinced them that the claims of Christianity are sober, absolute truth!
Lord Kelvin who established thermodynamics as a science said, “With regard to the origin of life, science positively affirms creativepower.”
Sir William Ramsey was one of history’s most notable archaeologists. He had graduated from Oxford with a Ph. D. and was also a very wealthy man. He had been reared by atheistic parents and was himself an outspoken atheist. He’d openly declared his intention to utilize his archeological expertise to disprove the Bible. After years spent in the Holy Land, attempting to discredit the Scriptures, he produced a book that shocked the world of Biblical criticism. In it he announced that his Archaeological digs had led him to one inescapable conclusion. The Bible was true after all; he had become a Christian.
Dr. Robert Dick Wilson, formerly a professor at Princeton, was a man whose scholastic accomplishments were truly amazing. While still a student in seminary he was able to read the entire New Testament in nine different languages, and that included a Hebrew translation that he had memorized word for word! During his lifetime he actually mastered forty-five languages and dialects so that he could examine and investigate the Bible in the languages in which it had been translated. There can be little doubt that he was the world’s most out-standing authority on ancient languages of the Middle East. After forty-six years of intensive study of the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, his faith in its inspiration and accuracy was unshakable.
Dr. Werner Von Braun, rocketry and space scientist, and past director of NASA said, “{It is} as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of God … as it is to comprehend a Theologian who would deny the advances of civilization.”
Many other men and women of outstanding intellect and achievement could be cited who have openly declared their faith in the Bible and Christianity.
When we read of people such as these becoming believers, some very obvious questions come to mind. What was it that caused them to decide in favor of the Bible and Christianity? Surely men such as these wouldn’t have embraced the claims of Christianity without having found good, solid reasons for doing so? What were those reasons?
WHAT IF GOOD REASONS FOR BELIEVING DO EXIST?
Stop for just a moment and think about it. What if the Bible really IS the revelation given to man by the Creator? What if there actually IS life after death? And what if there really Is a Heaven and a Hell? C.S. Lewis has correctly said, “Christianity if false is of no importance … and if true, of infinite importance.
The one thing it cannot be is moderately important.”
In our present day age of skepticism far too many people write Christianity off without ever giving it a fair hearing. They’re under the impression that science and the Bible are at odds, and this mistaken idea causes some to reject the Bible and Christianity without ever investigating the facts.
What about YOU? Have YOU ever taken the time to honestly and fairly seek out the facts for yourself?
You can be wrong, and marry the wrong person and still get by. You can be wrong
about choosing your life’s and still muddle through. You can be wrong about the
place that you put down your roots and spend your lifetime there. You can be wrong
about a lot of things and somehow bumble through, miserable though it may be.
BUT THERE’S ONE THING YOU CAN’T AFFORD TO BE WRONG ABOUT.
AND THAT’S THE DESTINY OF YOUR SOUL.
ETERNITY IS A MIGHTY LONG TIME.
Posted by cdrnorth at August 31, 2007 9:45 AM