Answering Doubts Q&A - Speaker Panel

let's go ahead and start with a question from Twitter Thanks okay I guess I can read it so it says what do you see is one of the biggest issues with churches today and how a lot of them seem to be afraid to tackle the big social issues of the day hmm hear me now hello I'll just speak up for the time being hello there we are I like that I like the sound of that voice just kidding I think this is a really good question it comes at quite a tender moment I think in our culture as well one of the problems the major problems with the church that I see today and something that really troubles me and I know that the three of us have talked about this before too and it troubles us is first of all the infighting we see in so many churches there seems to be a lot of division in the church itself over issues that I think are quite petty and sometimes over issues that really shouldn't be the dominant issues because when we're fighting with one another it tends to take our focus off of what we need to be focusing on niche namely is Christ and his will it's funny when you set your eyes on Christ and making yourself his disciple and his apprentice and you devote yourself to that to trying to follow him so that he permeates every dimension of your personality then many of the petty differences tend to fall away when we become become united in that commitment it tends to bring things into perspective but when we lose that focus we tend to major on the minors and when we major on the minors some of the major social issues outside the church some of the issues that should be taken demanding our attention demanding a response are not being paid attention to and we're losing focus and I think when I first moved to the States I came from Europe in 1998 it was quite an interesting experience for me because I came to the south I live in Atlanta Georgia now and one of the surprising features of the church culture in Atlanta at least that I came into contact with was that there everybody was a Christian no matter what you said no matter what you did no matter how you lived your life it didn't matter everybody was a Christian it was really my first contact with nominal Christianity I'd come from Vienna Austria a place where people aren't so much atheist or agnostic as totally apathetic on the question of religion they just didn't care whether there was a God or not they wanted to live their lives so in other words in that kind of a context either you are truly committed to what you believe you are truly a Christian or you're not there's no middle ground I think what we're seeing more and more now is vanishing middle ground in North America and I think in many ways this is a good thing but it's also going to show who truly believes what they say they believe because in a context of vanishing middle ground where social issues are really ramping up and pushed and Christians are being put on the spot and they're being asked questions that have serious even legal repercussions it's going to be interesting to see who actually sticks by what they say they believe whether it's just a matter of words or whether it's really just a cultural commitment or a nominal commitment so I think there's a sea change sort of taking over the North American landscape and I think we see that we see the church really caught up in that struggle but I also think there's a lot of reason for encouragement I think we're seeing greater numbers of people who are becoming very genuine about their faith and who are becoming more and more bold and who are really coming to terms with the fact of what it means to be a Christian to follow Christ to apprentice oneself to him and make him your Supreme Lord and Master Lordship that's a very odd issue in America we don't we don't tend to think of a king or we don't think in terms of paying our dues to a king or a ruler but is Christ your Lord it's something that I think we have to come to grips with it's something that we have to wrestle with a little bit in this context hi so I understand that God's grace is unending but does God ever get disappointed when we make the same or commit the same sin over and over again and like I'm trying not to make the same mistake but then it just happens and I'm it seems like I'm trying to fight or like overcome sin on my own but like how do you rely on God's strength like is there a specific way or yeah yeah um thank you for your honesty have to say that then the microphone to everybody so um I don't know if any of you are how much TV watch hopefully not too much but I used to be a huge fan of house TV show house this world of infectious disease is just like fascinated me I was just all into bacteria and viruses and all these kind of things so there was this there was this one episode on house um where LL Cool J was actually on house he was um he was a on death row in prison and he got sick with something and he had to be treated in the hospital and now the other doctors did not want to treat him because they were like he's on death row so they were not being very nice to him so he's getting this one procedure done called the lumbar puncture and I was going to what that is but he was again this one procedure done where you had to be really careful otherwise it would hurt and omar epps was the doctor he was working on him and he was being really mean and nasty to him and so finally LL Cool J rolls over and says to him do you know what it's like to have your whole life be about the worst thing you ever did and that struck me and I think what's so amazing about the grace of God is that our life isn't all about our sins and our failures he sees your struggle and he sees that you are trying to please him and he will help you through that and I think there are certain things that we get that we go through in life that we can just change like this and sometimes it takes us a little bit longer because it may be some action or thought or whatever that's deeper rooted and so I think what happens is the danger in all of this is that while God is working with you and helping you to grow is that you also can do the opposite and you can start bringing a condemnation on yourself and I'm horrible and what's wrong with me and I can get it together and God hates me and all these kind of things when really it's it's the opposite his grace is enough for you and he's patient with you and he's kind and he would and he will continue to work in you to change you and the fact that your that your heart the fact that you're even in line asking this question is a demonstration of where your heart is that Lord I want to please you and I'm struggling with this and can you help me so what I would encourage you to do is to just continue to just ask for his help but don't torment yourself in your mind and put yourself down because you keep failing just keep working at it and keep growing and he will continue to give you strength you can't do it on your own you're right and that's part of the frustration he's got to do it with you your life is not all about the worst things that you do and all the mistakes that you make because his grace is bigger than that okay okay thank you can can I take a moment also just to say briefly that before you go find someone to pray with we're not meant to walk in these kinds of sins alone if there's anything that we're addicted to or anything that causes problems in our lives or repeated sin in our lives the first thing Satan will try to do in order to get you to fall is make you feel like you're alone and you're not whatever you're doing you're not the first person to do it the stuff you're struggling with you're not the first person yeah and God has designed and planned a way out pray with others and find someone here and and really let that out let that out and and and through the community that God has given you around you a fine release yeah can can we you come talk to me afterwards as well thank you okay hi hi um so a lot of my friends they're a non-christian and they believe they don't believe in God because of evolution and having studied biology for four years I understand that there's a lot of evidence behind evolution because of carbon dating and fossil records but also as a Christian I see a lot of evidence of creationism and Jesus so how would you explain to someone who believes in evolution that the Bible is credible mm-hmm okay so there's there's a lot of stuff going on here Bible credibility atheism evolution you know throw it all on a hat and mix it up it's a fun mix of stuff going on well the first thing I would say is when it comes to evolution there is a lot of different types of evolution so when we're talking about evolution we should be clear which one for example when we're talking about micro evolution or even speciation we can demonstrate that we know it does happen with like Darwin's finches for example that is something that does happen even speciation it's been demonstrated I think it was out here in California along a certain valley the rim of the valley there was a salamander that was shown to have evolved around that rim of the valley such that when it came back around they could no longer interbreed and so you had speciation these kinds of evolution have been demonstrated but they do not prove that kind of evolution which is often used by atheists or agnostics or whoever to make the point that life could have evolved by itself life as we know it and all the different kinds out there could be evolved by itself so so far what I've said is there are certain kinds of evolution which we know happen but that kind of evolution which tries to deny God's sovereign creation over the world that simply doesn't it has not been demonstrated and our tons of problems with that kind of evolution some of the major issues that people have had to deal with our how over time in the archaeological record there are things that are explosions of what we would call creation or evolution whatever where do you want to pick in that specific sense there's these explosions once called a Cambrian explosion when all of a sudden it seems like all these different life forms popped into existence how do you explain that with gradual stepwise evolution Darwinian evolution you simply cannot so that's one major problem of evolution in that sense another major problem with evolution this would be this is starting to get kind of specific but those who argue for evolution in that more harsh sense here have hit a roadblock and that is that there is no way to explain the body plans and we can go into that what was the name of the book that recently came out which talked about this I don't recall but there's a book so look it up body plan so Carson you know what I'm talking about what book is that Steven Myers most recent book um Darwin's doubt Darwin's doubt that's the one stuff go hick that up it talks about this so there are problems very serious killer problems with evolution as presented in that way that said I want us all to be good thinkers and not to immediately deny evolution because people around us deny it okay I've seen this happen a lot within Christians they're like well what am I supposed to believe okay I'll say what I'm supposed to believe but that's just mindless you a we ourselves need to think we need to take a look at the evidence and if this is a big issue for us input by the way there are some Christians out there for whom this is not an issue they see evolution as something that God could have used to create the world and they say that that doesn't oppose the Bible as long as they've thought about it and biblically come up with the defense with that kind of a thing I respect that at the same time we need to understand is this - important for us and if it is what is the evidence revolution I remember looking at the evidence for evolution I was listening to atheist speak and they presented some brand new argumentation I never heard before it had to do with retroviral DNA and how we can there's arguments for common descent etc through this and my gut reaction my response should not be well how do I refute this that's thinking more or less like a zealot or thinking after having come to a conclusion you should say well let me let me pursue this information let me let me go down this track here's the thing if you believe in Jesus if you believe in God then never doubt I'm sorry never fear doubting never fear doubting because what Jesus tells us is he's the life in the truth in the way right the truth I said that backwards some of you're calling me a heretic you said that backwards the people whatever in the way the truth of life if Jesus is the truth then don't fear truth that's where your faith should carry you in saying okay if Jesus is the truth and I'm gonna pursue that I'm going to pursue that you're providing this argument to me we're abutting this I'm going to pursue that because at the end of the day I am Not Afraid of the truth because I believe Jesus is found wherever the truth is so your last issue the Bible then how does all this relate to the Bible well a lot of it has to do with the way people read Genesis we need to make sure that we are accountable for how we read the Bible some people tell us to read the Bible a certain way other people tell us to read the Bible another way there's more than one way to read the Bible folks and you got to figure out why you're picking the way that you're picking this is what happens when we start thinking and owning our own faith and so we read Genesis we're responsible before God for for our beliefs and so read it for yourself and understand is this posing a problem for me personally my personal take on evolution I don't see enough evidence that's consistent with the theory in order to show that evolution happened I simply don't if there were that kind of evolution I that kind of evidence I wouldn't be afraid of it at all and I want to embrace whatever the truth is but I don't see it regardless one last issue I think you should think of when talking to friends is the issue of evolution covers one thing and that's how lower forms of life became higher forms of life I think the bigger question is how did we get life in the first place how did we get that beginning of life there's all kinds of ideas on how the origin of life may have happened but none of them explain this world none of them explain this existence of one of them actually work is what I'm trying to say so one person to look into for that his name is fuzz Rana and he has written a few books on the origins of life but how do you get from not life to life that's the big mind-blowing thing how did any life exist in the first place - we've all if evolution is true and that's where I would talk with your friends I would focus on that issue thanks it's broke okay what's up guys my name is Melvin first of all I just wanna say thank you for coming thank you it's awesome uh you guys are cool caring you got that sweet soul patch Lucia you got that mad style appeal you're tall we should play ball after okay I'm sorry a question time question time um yeah so I've just been thinking a little bit about this just like you know Jesus died 2,000 years ago the Christian Church has been around you know for pretty much that much time and yeah like so God is all-powerful he can do anything he wants to and like beginning and acts like the church was crazy you know they'd see like thousands of people coming to Christ and just community happening and my question is like knowing that God so powerful and the church can be too and like the body is I guess why over the past 2,000 years has the Christian like body what hasn't been more I guess victorious in a sense of like you know why isn't like you know this is a gospel it's the most powerful thing in the world why isn't it like dominating over nations you know rather than thing being Wars and all this stuff yeah thanks I'll just briefly comment on that and then I'll allow my colleagues to comment and I think it'd be helpful for the rest of the questions if you do have someone in mind on who you want to answer it identify that person and that will help I would say one thing about the Christian faith flourishing is that it seems to flourish most when people are in distress when people are not comfortable the Christian faith is designed for those I think who have grappled with brokenness grappled with destruction all around them and in are now coming to terms with that we in the West are super comfortable we're super self-reliant and in that sense we're prideful when we pray the the the Lord's Prayer give us this day our daily bread we kind of like flyover that like I can go to Safeway to get my daily bread you know I really don't need to pray for it but sure God you told me to so I will you know it whereas the Christian faith for those who day by day are struggling that is where I see power in in the community of course God's power is always there but in the community I remember in 2006 I think it was 2007 I had a colleague who was studying with me at Biola and he worked in Lebanon he lived in Lebanon and so he went back there and then all of a sudden there was a war that broke out and he wrote email to us saying pray and some of us started responding saying God we pray that the war would end his response came to us immediately saying do not pray that the war will end so that's not what we want the you know in times of war people start turning to God pray that God would be made known through this war and I just remembered that that had an indelible impact on me so I think that's part of it early on in the Christian faith you had a ton of people who were being persecuted things like the Diocletian edict where people were being sent to jail being killed for for having scriptures that they wouldn't turn in etc and the moment you see Christianity stop having that kind of power is when it the Roman Empire embraces Christianity all of a sudden 50% of the Roman Empire is Christian and now you don't see that anymore it went from being a persecuted Church to a nun persecuted Church so while it's on the one hand that was good for the Christians on the other hand you all of a sudden you stop seeing that that outpouring of the power of the Holy Spirit at least recorded in in some of those some of those early church records that's my take if you guys want to briefly add yeah and I'll just latch on to some of what Nabila said there I think this is so good it's amazing the way a crisis seems to strip stuff down to its bare essentials I remember one of the writers I really liked Walker Percy he talks about why isn't that in the West in particular as Nabil was saying in cultures where we're comfortable we sit around and were generally quite shy and it takes a lot when we meet new people to open up to them but if it if a crisis happens if something drastically bad happens if there's a fire or you're on a plane and you're experiencing problems you can feel it all of a sudden you have this greater affinity for those around you and all the petty social squabbles all those minor differences tend to drift away and you're reduced to just people together trying to hold on to each other in this time of crisis so I think we see a similar theme here when we're comfortable when we're in a place where we are misled by the illusion that we can make it on our own resources that we can care of ourselves we forget that we're actually suffering under a delusion of being self-sufficient and sometimes it takes a crisis in our lives sometimes something awful happens to us an illness we lose somebody and we suddenly realize how fragile life truly is and how we are not in control and how in the end we ourselves can't save ourselves we can't control life and that tends to remind us if we are open to it and if we are honest of our dependence and our reliance upon God and in those moments the Lord's Prayer takes on a whole new significance and meaning of praying that God will give us what we need give us our daily bread and deliver us from evil and so I think I think it's true I think oftentimes comfort convenience these are great things but they are also dangerous and I think this is why the church tends to flourish in a setting where we're reminded or where we know and there's no question about the fact that we're not in control that we are not self-reliant and that we can't make it on our own so I think a very good question I think it gets at the heart of so much of our unique struggles here in the North American setting as well hello my name is Luke and I just want to thank you for the conference that you've put here and I'm involved in a Speech and Debate league and we actually have an event called apologetics the defence of the Christian faith and I just wanted to ask you a question from one of the categories that we have to present about in our Speech and Debate competitions and it is how is a Christian stewardship distinct from the environmentalist movement well how is Christian stewardship distinct from the environmentalist movement I mean I'll just to throw a quick answer there I think the Christian the Christian movement is is focused around God whereas the environmentalist movement is focused around the environment yeah okay um how can I clean this up no um I'm joking I'm totally joking no actually I mean I guess I would I actually would have to agree with Nabil I mean I think I think it's just I think it's a difference of the Christian stewardship movement is focused focused on recognizing that there is beauty and what God has done and therefore we want to protect it and grateful for I love nature when my favorite smile was job and several chapters of her devoted just God and talking about his amazing creation and I love it so I am a big supporter of that however I think with the environmental movement I think what I what I wonder is and this kind of getting back to what I was maybe referencing the talk is what is the purpose of trying to save this environment if the role is just going to be destroyed anyways so I see almost a sense of efforts and and and like a care and like almost like a reverence for something but that but there's nothing there that's given it reverence or honor in that sense so I almost kind of wonder have they just you know imposed a certain kind of value to the planet that their worldview doesn't hold whereas for me although I don't think it tree is more important than a person I am grateful for God's creation I do think it's beautiful and you know Bible says the heavens declare the glory of God in the earth shows the work of his hand so I definitely think it's beautiful in that sense so yeah and and that's what I was getting at what she said when it comes to when it comes to environmentalists which you have from that perspective is the world that's around you is incidental it's what's there so let's take care of it whereas from the Christian perspective we're given this world you start you see in Genesis from the very beginning the point of the the world that man was given the atom was Givens to be steward over that and so now now we have imbued with purpose both our creation and the world around us and so in that sense I think when Christians take a look at the environment we should feel a sense of ownership over it a sense of stewardship that's much deeper than the environmentalist sense of stewardship which is incidental not not grounded in the creation of that also I believe that kind of in the manifestation of the way environmental environmentalists often work what you have is that desire to serve something greater than you something outside you same thing with people who go crazy for brand names I don't know if any of you've ever been in Japan but some people will just adidas everything adidas and will go running and then I'm adidas or whatever Nike or whatever they just grab on to a brand or a sports team we do that here right so certain sports teams all about what we have in LA Lakers you know whatever stop yeah so it's like just 100% they try to latch onto something greater than themselves and I think that's a natural human inclination in in this case it's manifested towards the environment I think what it's supposed to point to is towards God latch on is something greater than ourselves well the one thing that's eternal so in that sense I think we have asked you on the environmentalist but I think the core of it is once again there's a purpose here in the Christian perspective and it comes from true value not incidental value I uh my non-christian dad asked me and my sister question while we were coming here that kept him from believing and like God and so it was there are many kind people who do good in their lives and that don't believe in God but still go to hell but isn't that sort of really unfair so how do we like answer him and sort of encourage him towards God mm-hmm yeah I would say if the criteria to get into heaven was you had to be good and so then a good people someone who did good deeds end up in hell then yeah I would say that's unfair but the reality is it's not my heaven so I don't get to make the rules and and and I say that not in it at all in a nasty sense but in the sense of it amazes me how as as humanity we have this idea in us that I'm a good person therefore I'll go to heaven what does the idea come from that just because I do good things I'm gonna go to heaven somehow we form this correlation between I do good and God will accept me but what would that look like so it looks like I so I go before God and I say all right god I've done you know it's a yeah I've died to go before God I say God I've done 10,000 good deeds therefore you have to let me in okay what so he's now he's has to say okay I guess you're telling me I have to let you in because you have done it or whatever the person who's standing behind you in line and it is only done 9999 I guess it's things to be them you know it so so what is the quantity of good deeds that we need to do to get there is what I want to know when people raise that quite as that point is if I have you do good deeds therefore God will accept you well how many do you have to do number one number two that means being in this whole morality saying how do you know what good is does one does one bad deed you know disqualify a bunch of other ones is is this good or the situation good over here is a good period this way over here so now you're in that kind of situation again how do you know what's good but I think the third thing and for me this is the most important is it really true that you would want to believe in a God that will only accept you and allow you into heaven because you've earned it in other words he only accepts you because of what you've done so if you let this thing about the in terms of our parents right my children are born they've caused the labor process cause their mother a lot of pain right and they come out and what does the mother say I love you just for you you are you haven't done anything but caused me pain you won't work for the next 18 years of your life you know you won't work for the next 18 years of your life you know you won't support I mean we're gonna have to put our time and our energy and your waking up at night but you know what I love you anyway because you're my child and that's why God looks at us you don't have to earn my love but would we feel like if our parents said okay mom I did all these things today your checklist of things now do you love me now do you love me how would that make us feel to live a life like that and this idea of that I'm good therefore he'll accept me means that you're essentially saying I'm okay with serving a god who will only love me if I do certain things and that's just not the Christian God it's definitely out of God I'd want to serve so that's a great question I may hear I'll hear it a lot and so I just question people on how many good things do we have to do how do we know what good is and number three most apparently for me I don't know if that's a god I want I know if that's a heaven I'd want to go to because that certainly seems like it's a place of a God who really doesn't genuinely love me hello my name is no chief chee I'm just father part of the same speech in debate club that week is part of okay likewise on a question is Christianity a religion of intolerance no I go okay um I mean I just have to grieve and feel again and say no I don't think it is no I I really genuinely genuinely don't and this is why for whatever reason we have formed this idea that if you profess something as true you're being intolerant everything else and just like we were talking about this morning when I was talking about truth truth by nature is exclusive okay so truth just by in and of itself is going to exclude other things so what Christians are doing is they're trying to share with people what they believe is true and they're not trying to say you know they're not trying to come down I mean it could come across that way but they're they're really not trying to come down on people and make it seem like I you know I won't be around you or anything like that in fact it's the opposite we're told to love our enemies it's a very opposite viewpoint of anything else so there isn't this really idea of us being intolerant of other people in fact for Christians we see value and everybody we see that people create an image of God we know how we are to treat other people regardless of of what how they believe in we were supposed to be the light of the world I mean even while Jesus on the cross he says Father forgive them the very people who have crucifying him so there's a for me I don't see any any place for intolerance at all but there is a place where we are also trying to share truth with people and I think often times that's excute that's confused with being intolerant and if intolerance is defined as a wholesale endorsement of anything then I would say that's a faulty view of Tolerance if well if tolerance is defined as the wholesale endorsement of any practice or any viewpoint I would say that's not even possible by nature truth can't is exclusive and you're going to commit to one set of beliefs that necessarily will exclude another but again as Alicia was saying the private the ultimate Christian command is to love God with all that you are and then to love others as yourself and I don't see any possible way in which this can be construed as intolerant you are told to love your enemies and moreover as Christians we believe that you are a child of God that fundamentally who you are is a person made in the image of God it doesn't matter what social background you come from it doesn't matter whether you're disabled whether you're gifted none of that is taken into account where your value is concerned I don't know of any other belief system or worldview that takes such a high view of the human person so high in fact that the God of all creation laid down his life for you for me that attaches a value to you that is just incomprehensible and so to look at that and to see it as intolerant is very very difficult for me if you actually look at it it's so hard to reconcile that with the actual Christian message that no matter who you are no matter what you've done no matter what's happened to you you are a person created in God's image and so I think we need to take that into account really wrestle with that really think about what that means when we consider the question of intolerance and particularly the way it's often framed in the media and in popular venues hi thank you so much for your time can you contrast the Christian view of man's destiny without a Buddhism well um so with my limited Buddhist knowledge the destiny of of Christian the ultimately is to be united and reunited with their Creator okay that you're here for a certain amount of time but ultimately the the place of the highest thing that we can air the greatest thing that we can look forward to is to be united with our Creator for Buddhism it's more of reaching this particular place of enlightenment or freeing yourself from desires and I guess in Christianity it's almost the opposite insensitive it's the complete fulfillment of everything you've ever wished for and everything you've ever wanted because you finally get to meet him face to face so I guess I would see them as reaching for two different things one is you know you are no longer searching or desiring anything and that somehow reaches you to this ultimate in my end State or as I desire very much so to see the face of Jesus if I weren't a Christian I would find Buddhism very compelling because Buddhism says essentially that life boiled down to its core is pain and because life is pain the problem is you have desires the problem is you form attachments to things to people and that's going to cause you more pain so what do you have to do get rid of your desires and what do you ultimately have to do get rid of yourself if face yourself and achieve Nirvana so your identity ultimately in Buddhism needs to be dissolved and then you are truly free but Christianity far from that does the does the absolute opposite it says that you are your identity is rooted and fixed and who God has made you and you are fundamentally made by God for God or eternal communion with him for your his joy in you to be made complete CS Lewis calls this the inconsolable secret of our hearts and so oftentimes we go through our lives searching for this ultimate sense of fulfillment and joy and when we look in all these different places we often look in all the wrong places we become addicts in the process we become so distraught and we become so disillusioned and we feel so betrayed that sometimes if we believe that if we believe there is no God if we conclude there is no God in our search I can see how somebody would say well get rid of your desires but as a Christian I'm here to tell you that your desires are not misleading you your hunger for paradise means something and we can learn something profound from it this is why CS Lewis says if I find in myself a desire for an experience which nothing in this world can satisfy the most likely explanation is that I was made for another world and what you want is to be recognized and loved for who you are it's so interesting you look into the lives of some of the people who are famous who have achieved so much success who have really seen their wildest dreams realized and then they feel so broken and hurt when it doesn't do for them what they thought it would I think of Kurt Cobain a guy who I looked up to for so many years when I was in high school and he said in his very in his letter of suicide he said I used to love going up on stage I would relish the roar of the crowd I just fed off that energy and I loved it but it's not enough anymore it's not doing it for me and I can't even begin to describe to you how guilty I feel about it it's not enough because in the end we're satisfied by nothing less than the king of all creation looking upon us and saying well done good and faithful servant and so as Alesia said those desires reach their culmination and fulfillment in Christianity but if not then they feel like a total and cruel betrayal hi um so I'm Tim and this is more of a personal question but as someone who's grown up in the church I've seen the capacity of Christians for hypocrisy and backstabbing all those kinds of things and so it can be difficult to trust your brothers and sisters in Christ and essentially my question boils down to is there room for cynicism in Christianity is there room for cynicism don't give a cynical response Nabil I'm trying man I'm trying um I am interested to hear your your opinion on this we're two ends of the spectrum I don't know if you've noticed this yet but Cameron's like I would be a Buddhist if I weren't a Christian because life boiled down to his cores pain and I'm like dude life boiled down to his core is awesome it's just like we're just like two opposite ends here so I'd be interested to see what your perspective is on this one thing I would want to say though is that the thing about the church the thing about the body of Christ what's fascinating to me about it is that God has chosen this instrument in order to minister to the world I don't know if you've noticed this yet or not but he tends to work through people and he wants he's placed you he's given you certain gifts and skills he's given me certain gifts and skills and he works through people to reach others who are hurting so somehow he uses us to do that but at the same time in order to get into this club in order to get into the church you have to admit you're a sinner so if there's any place we can expect to find brokenness it would be in a group of people who admit that they are broken so when we come to a church I would especially a lot of people see the church as you know their church I would expect to see some people in that church who are not yet really Christian for one some who yeah are still wrestling with their brokenness their hypocrisy their cynicism they're still wrestling with that a lot of people have left the Christian faith based on not Christianity but things Christians have done and I would encourage anyone who's in that position said my pastor hurt me or my church hurt me you know and in those hurts or real hurts and those pains or real wounds I would encourage that person to think for a moment that their broken people where as Christ Christ has not hurt anyone was it Gandhi who said I love Christa I loved Christianity I hate Martin okay I love to Jesus Christian yeah I like your Christ I don't like your Christians it's like I like the idea of Christ I like who Christ is I like that person but but Christians have somehow mucked it up and and the fact the matter is yes we are broken people this church is broken a lot of people also take the name Christian for themselves I think in the most recent survey somewhere between 80 to 85 percent of the United States call themselves Christian where an I would never call those people a Christian for me the criterion of being Christian is do you follow Jesus that's not the sole criterion but that is the main criterion do you follow Jesus if someone calls themselves a Christian and doesn't follow Jesus doesn't ride as even care you're there now what that person does is going to be imputed to the church people are going to see that as hypocrisy so when you say you know is there room for cynicism I'm feeling where you're coming from I'm feeling the hurt the betrayal the suffering and all that I'm feeling the personal it sounds like their personal relationships that have caused some real deep pains there and I understand that I this happened to me it's happened to me and I can't go into those those stories because there's still people involved but you know that kind of thing has happened to me what I hope that cynicism can translate into is a personal drive to reflect Christ more a personal drive to reflect Christ more because if we if we see the brokenness in somebody else there's only so much we can do for that person and quite often if there was emotions involved relationship involved it's probably a good idea not to do anything there but to instead embody grace instead to to make sure that we do not do that to others or to the best of our ability we don't we don't lord things over other people oftentimes pridefulness or oftentimes and an image of perfection is what causes others to fall we got to make sure we don't do that part of part of our struggles as ministers when we're handed microphones and put on a stage is that we have to let people know that though we're speaking what we believe to be is true we're not perfect people you know we we have to we have to convey that too because if we try to pretend like we're perfect before others we can hurt people when we fall I know this was this one church in Colorado where two major tragedies happen at the same time both related the first one was that the pastor was caught having multiple adultery this is one of the largest churches in Colorado and so many people immediately became cynical and and many of them left the church will some state and out of those that stayed a few weeks later twelve-year-old in the congregation came with a gun and started randomly shooting people and the reason why he was randomly shooting people is this exact thing he felt like he had been betrayed by the church so that one church underwent two major tragedies one after another so the cynicism how do we process that how do we translate that we should let it drive us towards Christ get us on our knees to say God this pain I know is not right I don't want to be the cause of this pain to others help me forgive help me show grace because if if you were willing to forgive me that parable where there was a man who would who owed a huge debt and he was forgiven and yet he demanded that someone who owed him a small debt be thrown into jail if we have been sinned against by someone and we feel angry at them and let that cynicism burn within us then we are that slave holding this other slave accountable when we've received so much forgiveness from God I think there's a verse in Matthew chapter 7 it's either 16 or 21 somewhere else which says that unless you forgive you will not be forgiven and the idea here essentially is that if you receive true forgiveness from God you will pour that forward to others you'll see your own brokenness before his holiness and then you'll look at other people's brokenness and say I see myself in you I see myself in you so is there room for cynicism my answer would be brother if it drives you to Christ and only in that way otherwise it will start eating at your heart and it will be a poison to you it'll be a poison to you forgiveness is expunging that and grace is expunging that embodying christ is then ministering to those around you through your pains yeah I don't have I honestly don't have much to add to that Nabil that was fantastic yet just to say that cynicism if it's unaddressed it I understand we need to be circumspect and realistic about the fact that we are dealing with human beings and because of that and believe me I felt the sting of this one too I've had people who I've trusted who have I've experienced betrayals and I've seen and it's also when it comes from the hands of somebody who is a brother in Christ or a sister in Christ somebody you trust and you love it does have it carries with it the real temptation to make us jaded but cynicism if it really takes root in your heart can become a profound form of soul sickness just look at our culture I think we're one of the most sinister Coll cultures out there because cynicism thinks it sees through everything and understands everything about human motives sees through everybody and reduces everybody and it closes you off from learning from connecting with others and oftentimes it can really end up isolating you and it can calcify in your heart and so if it acts as an initial goad to pursuing a higher degree of Christlikeness I think that's the only possible way I think that you could countenance cynicism but it's a it's something we have to be very careful with because it doesn't take a whole lot before it completely infiltrates your thinking it tends to take over the way you look at Pete the world human beings and it can profoundly warp your understanding because in spite of all of our brokenness and our mistakes there are wonderful people out there there are wonderful outpourings of the gospel we were just reminded at one of our meetings recently that all around the world the gospel is bearing fruit just look at China there is so much to be encouraged about the gospel has not lost any of its power we carry this treasure in earthen vessels yes but it is a treasure and the Lord by His great grace has allowed us fallen as we are to be messengers of light and I think we need to take all it concentrate all of our hope all of our comfort in that into that marvelous fact and I think that needs to really guide our perspective and our thoughts and the way we look at others in the world for the sake of time and with great sadness softly our last question so um I have another question for you yeah on Islam and Christianity um for us Christians we we know that we're going to go to heaven when we repent and accept the fact that we are sinners and we sincerely follow Jesus like without all of our hearts now with a Muslim when they sincerely follow Allah do they know if they're going to be forgiven or they still don't know if that makes sense yeah it does Thanks um thanks for your question as we minister to people it is important to enter into their mindsets enter into the way they see the world because we tend to often answer questions or or say words expecting other people to to think the same meaning the same definition applies to certain words usually when people especially like Muslims for example use the word sin that doesn't mean the same thing that it means for Christians so I'm glad you're doing exactly the stepping into their mindset when it comes to the Muslim notion of well for one following most generally people don't follow Allah when it comes to Islam people follow Islam slight distinction and Muslims would say of course we follow Allah but pay attention to the rhetoric pay attention to the terminology from what I've seen usually it's honoring Islam and there's a difference there the the zeal that I've seen amongst Christians has been for God the zeal that I've seen amongst Muslims has been for Islam I haven't seen too many Christians zealous about Christianity it's about Jesus there's a distinction there I think it's an important one to grasp and while entering into the mindset but what your question is is accurate generally speaking traditional Orthodox Islam Muslims could not have been assured of their salvation there were a few circumstances in which you could for example if you would participate in certain battles with Muhammad then you would have been allowed in for example a battle above it that was one another is if you died in Jihad then you would be assured of salvation that was another there are some other circumstances in focus LOM as well some Muslims believe that if you're on the Hajj then and you die in the middle of Hajj then you'd go to heaven so there's those but traditionally in the broad-strokes according to Islamic theology no you couldn't know if you were saved or not one of the hadith by Muhammad's successor of a buck according to according to him he said even if I had one foot in heaven I would still fear the deception of Allah in other words if I have one foot in heaven Allah could still rip me out and put me back in hell that's that's a hadith it's a tradition and so generally speaking that's been the view now I do also want to point out that nowadays Muslims kind of believe whatever they want especially in the u.s. they kind of mix and match whatever and so I know a ton of Muslims who would now say I'm assured of my salvation but 20 years ago you wouldn't have heard that so it is important to ask the Muslims that that are around you and that you're connecting with what do they believe that's an important one but traditionally that surance salvation only comes in very certain select circumstances and they never really have it I think that is a very interesting point though I have a friend whose parents who he comes from a Shia background he's Muslim now a Christian now and his parents would say to him that Ali had said those who do good deeds out of fear of Hell wanting to get into heaven they are like slaves whereas those who do good deeds out of love for God are like are like true followers and now that he's a Christian he says to his parents don't you realize that's the Christian message is that God has given us heaven when we do good deeds it's not because we're trying to earn his favor like someone said earlier you know it does God get disappointed us when we fail know God's love for us is infinite it's it's it's his love for us that brings us into heaven so we don't have to worry about that what we when we do things for God it's out of an expression of love like if I want to give my parents a gift you know that's that's because because I love them if they tell me to do something and I'd only do it because I'm afraid they'll punish me that's not love but if they tell me to do something I do it because I want them to be happy and I love that that's why the Christian does the good deeds that they do same thing for it for self-sacrifice for others you know it's it's not to earn something for myself it's not indirectly selfish it's truly altruistic I love you because you are worthy of love so there's a very big difference there did I answer your question okay great thanks let's give the speaker panel another hand thank you guys so much

Channel: RZIM HQ

Views: 92,834

Rating: 4.8623719 out of 5

Keywords: Ravi Zacharias (Author), RZIM, Ravi Zacharias International Ministries, Christ, Jesus Christ (Deity), God (Deity), Jesus, Christianity (Religion), Apologetics

Id: Bz9iI7YpqG8

Length: 54min 58sec (3298 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 19 2014