Non-Christians Ask Me Questions

uh-oh technical difficulties yeah okay we're live sorry YouTube was like telling me your life streams not working try again so I tried again welcome to Tuesday livestream I am Pastor Mike winger and this is the 5:00 p.m. on Tuesdays Pacific Standard Time by the way live stream where we tackle issues of theology and apologetics today it's your questions and when I say your I actually specifically mean non-believers or non-christians I want to take your questions today in the live chat that's the goal that's the plan today I hope we're already getting some of those questions what you do is put a capital Q and then just put your question in the chat you don't need to tag me in it because I'm not able to read the chat there's too many chats for me to read my mods will take your questions and send them to me and I will be answering them once we start getting them so thank you so much for joining me I put like a few rules in the video description that to give you guys kind of what I'm looking for today now this could easily turn into just because I have a lot of experience answering questions from non-believers on line this could easily turn into this thing where I'm basically trying to field insincere trick questions that people have asked over and over and even when they hear good answers they don't care they just like their ask they like to ask their question and try to see people dance I'm not super interested in that I would like sincere questions people who have real real questions and they want an honest and open answer I don't promise that I can give you the best answer in the world but I'm gonna try I'm gonna try to give you the best answer I can and I really appreciate you guys joining me here so it's good to be back I haven't done a video in like two weeks I think it's been like about two weeks and we was out of town and then I was out of timing twice in a row actually once for the a conference and then because of a vacation to visit my dad in Arizona so um so yeah so you send those questions on over and then my my buddy AJ is gonna forward those to me and I'll just be waiting I told him to wait until the livestream started because what happens is people load up their questions in the live chat before I'm even live online and then all the people who come for the actual live stream they don't get their questions in so I will say this as a way of kind of preparing us for the moment as I'm getting your questions populated in our chat I have found that that the most common objections to Christianity the ones I hear the most often and I'm talking about on the street like just talking normal people the most common objections of Christianity are usually the worst ones and the hardest objections as in the ones that that would make you really scratch your chin and I would like release really take some time and think this over those objections are usually not anywhere to be seen in the minds of those who were rejecting Christianity I wonder why that is I don't I don't know if I have an explanation for that but but I also acknowledge this that those objections they seem hard to the people who are offering them like they seem like good and legitimate objections to Christianity objections to following Jesus to believing in Christ and so let's talk about it right let's see if if I might be able to offer you something that would push you one step closer to Jesus that's that's the point here that's my goal yeah I've been you know a a goal to see you know Christ and to be transformed and saved by the knowledge of him but I also realize those questions might be a stumbling block to you so maybe I can get one of your stumbling blocks out of the way that's the idea yeah let me I'll take one while I'm waiting for AJ to send me over a big list I have I see one like in the chat here from Isaac High who says how do you explain to non-christians that Jesus indeed was a real person this is actually a great questions about the historicity of Christ it's a it's a great under cutter for the gospel when you're telling people Jesus died on the cross for your sins and then they say Jesus never died on the cross like there is no Jesus he never existed in the first place that's a pretty substantial undercut it seems like a very good objection to Christianity one of the things I like to tell them there's two ways to go on this one is to try to walk them through all the evidence and you could talk to them about how we have so many different sources of of you know for the historicity of Jesus Christ whether we have it in the Gospels themselves we have it in Paul's writings and by the way these are different sources these are not the Bible isn't one book it's multiple books written by different authors over over a course of time it's gathered together but they're still different books different works and so those are all different first century sources that speak of the historicity of Jesus now when historians evaluate these sources they agree that Jesus was a real person and they can even line up a list of facts about Jesus that atheist historians non-christian historians will agree are really true about the real historical Jesus and so you could you could go down that path right like first you know gather the evidence that the the epistles the Gospels and then I can go to non-christian sources like Josephus and Tacitus and Maura Barr serabian and I can quote a large list of secular or I shouldn't really calm secular exactly but non-christian sources that support the historicity of Christ now the problem with that reasoning is that often the person who thinks Jesus didn't exist they don't really are not interested in the history of historicity question they've heard it online that sounded convincing to them they like the idea that Jesus didn't exist but they're not really seriously interested in an actual historical analysis of Jesus so sometimes what's more impressive is to tell them that historians laugh at them and I don't mean this as an insult I mean it's more like a wake up call right it's like historians themselves even atheist historians will laugh at your face if you think Jesus didn't exist there are like one or two guys out there Richard Carey or Bob Price who try to proclaim that Jesus didn't exist and they're not respected in their field and there's there's a reason for that it's because they're basically playing fast and loose with reality when they try to say Christ wasn't an actual historical person if you want there's two different taxes to take one show them the history or just tell them how silly it is sometimes that's more effective actually and it's true I'm not playing games it's very true that it's just ridiculous to claim Jesus didn't exist that he wasn't crucified under Pontius Pilate there are in fact historical facts that you can say about Christ that are agreed on by a consensus of historians that let me for instance he was real person he was really crucified under Pontius Pilate that the disciples had real experiences they thought were Jesus having risen from the dead and seeing him alive from the dead that real historical fact about Jesus there's a whole bunch of other ones that you can get into and I have done so in some videos on my channel and I have a video on the historicity of Jesus with dr. Michael okona who gets in there and blasts that sort of stuff out of the water so there's a couple different angles one show him the evidence to show him how silly it is yeah so let me let me take another question from you guys I gotta I already got some in the queue now this one is from and you know what let me add two because I just want to miss this opportunity the the minute there's something called the minimal facts this is what Gary Habermas who is one of the premier historians about Jesus in the world right now and this is what he he talks about he's a Christian too and he he offers these minimal facts he says here's the facts these four facts sometimes he uses five depends on how you word it these these facts that even secular historians will agree on about Jesus there's a consensus of scholarship and all these facts and he argues that those bare minimal facts skipping all the debated issues that those bare minimal facts are enough to argue that Jesus rose bodily from the dead that is a huge claim this is it this is pretty massive I want a non-believer to know this Christianity is saying that we can put forward Christians I should say are saying we can put forward a really strong historical case for the resurrection of Jesus even if we grant which we which I don't grant it really but even if we granted that a whole bunch of stuff in the Bible is false we could still prove that Jesus rose from the dead now that doesn't mean that those things in the Bible or false it means that we're just we're just saying let's get past all these debates and let's talk about the resurrection and I think it's a pretty powerful argument you should check out look up Gary Habermas he's got some stuff online camera Bertuzzi on capturing christianity recently put a video up of Gary Habermas going through the argument for the resurrection so yeah lemon difficult says this ask the question you've put off questions about first first Timothy and the role of women in the church do you struggle to accept this teaching is it ever hard to reconcile your human sense of justice with what the Bible says that's a great question lemon first let me let me offer a couple thoughts I'm assuming you're a non-believer because that's who we're asking for questions for so I would say as a not as a non-christian I would encourage you not worry about this question there's some people will be bothered by some aspect of Christianity that is secondary and they will use that as an excuse to reject Jesus now it's you could perfectly find say that you don't like what the Bible teaches about women that you think something's wrong with it but you're still convinced Jesus rose from the dead and I would say good for you for at least following the evidence where it leads that's a healthy that's a healthy positive thing I don't usually debate the issue of the role of women in the church with non-believers because what does it have to do with them I don't I don't understand except that I think that sometimes and I'm not accusing you this but sometimes people are trying to find something against Christianity or they want to find some stone to throw at it and so they go to a hot topic of our day like women women's rights and women's roles and so now I want to answer your question that was a preface okay do I struggle to accept the teaching in first Timothy no I don't struggle to accept it not to my knowledge what I'm trying to evaluate my own heart here the open open with you and honest I don't I don't think I struggle to accept it but I have a sense of fear and my fear is related to this what if I'm understanding this passage wrong what if what if my interpretation that is sort of a historical interpretation has kind of been the thinking of the church for a long time what if my interpretation was wrong and I'm telling people that they can't do certain things in ministry telling women they can't do certain things and I'm wrong and that scares me because I feel accountable for that now on the flip side what if I'm right and then I tell people to go out and do things in ministry women that they're not called to do maybe they were capable maybe they're skilled at it but God's not calling them to do it and so it's dishonouring the command of God that the sovereignty of God in his church and so I'm scared of that too and so this is um the reason why I'm avoiding answering to thoroughly on this question is is this reason this is a doctrine I have not yet gone back and thoroughly examined I've done this with some doctrines right now I'm in the series on penal substitution any atonement because I went back and thoroughly examined it now I can stand up and I can shout it from the rooftops when I've done it on this doctrine or on women and teaching I will do the same you're unfortunately in that zone where I haven't done that yet so I'm gonna ask you to not look at me as your as your source because I want to put my homework in all over again REE study the topic honestly I'll probably come out on the conservative side I so far I'm not persuaded by the by the the egalitarian arguments but I recognize there's areas of research I haven't done on this topic so I need to do that alright number two spearmint cookie says if it's so obvious that Christianity is true why do the overwhelming majority of scientists and people with high IQs not believe in God not just one or two but the majority I don't know that that's true yeah I don't know that's actually true experiment cookies so the number the overwhelming majority so that would be like what 7080 percent of people with high IQs don't believe in God I don't think that's remotely true I'm and and and I think there's a there's also a problem with correlation and causation here the fact that our our you know our universities and our higher education do have atheist leaning teachings I mean they do this is if you don't see this then you're really blind like the universities teach atheism on many levels not on every level it's not like just an appear in Asian in every class but in many ways it just teaches and proclaims an atheistic worldview and a purely naturalistic explanation of everything of in psychology we see this in anthropology we see this in the sciences we see this this sort of methodological naturalism that becomes an actual philosophical naturalism and forgive me for not explaining all those terms a lot of you guys know what I mean but yeah so the fact that that's going on means that the longer you stay in those those school programs the more likely you are to be you know be persuaded by atheism or at least lean towards it so I think that that is significant why because it would mean that it has nothing to do with intelligence here it has to do with indoctrination and if intelligent people think they're immune to indoctrination or if you think you're immune to indoctrination then you are you are especially vulnerable to it because you you means you don't see the indoctrination you're experiencing right now so yeah I think that that that I should say that I should also say things like for instance in in philosophy they did a survey of philosophers about God and and the majority philosopher said they did not believe in God the irony was that William Lane Craig who is himself a philosopher he said that he polled he casually pulled he called all the guys he knows that were philosophers are a bunch of them in different schools and in different fields and they all said that they were never even asked about this survey and so the survey seemed to be seems to be self selecting the philosophers that were not not believing in God to give us the impression that all philosophers don't believe in God now William Lane Craig was in the field he actually says that the majority of philosophers of religion because that means that that's their actual specialty they're not philosophy of science the philosophy of religion that they do believe in God so yeah I would say yeah there you go it and I'll add one more element one more element to it and that's this and that's that Christianity is not the religion of smart people nor of stupid people it's not your intelligence that makes you Christian you're confronted with the truth of Christianity as over everyone is but you make a choice how you respond to the gospel and that's how you respond to God how you deal with your personal sin and there's all kinds of dynamics going on there that have very little to do with your intelligence and so I wouldn't expect Christianity to result in greater numbers of smart people believing in Christianity maybe the smart people have greater accountability because there have greater understanding of the evidence that would that would make sense I hope that helps Nixie says what do you say to what seems to be sexism in 1st Corinthians 11 and first Timothy this is the same question I got before and how Old Testament women are treated as second-class I appreciate your view yeah Nick this is a big can of worms question 1st Corinthians 11 totally different passage and whole different host of questions than first Timothy which are both a whole different host of questions in Old Testament and how women are you say are treated as second-class I will say that well I'm trying to answer these different answers to these questions for the Old Testament women treated as second-class in some cases they were that doesn't mean the ultra Old Testament is saying women are second-class you have to recognize that it's in a culture and it's in a time where this is how things are and so it's it's just giving you a real example of what life was like at that time most of the laws about women though that you read about in the Old Testament you'll find are not oppressing them they're protecting them and that's pretty significant they're protecting them not oppressing them that's interesting for instance proverbs 31 talks about this wonderful woman and here she is she's a home she's a she's a business owner she buys a field and she hires workers so she's a boss and a business owner in proverbs 31 that seems to be an elevation of women and Jesus his treatment of women he he makes women his disciples when Martha and Mary are having their debate about whether or not Mary I think it's Mary who sits at his feet right and then tells his her sister her sister Martha is like Jesus Makemake Mary come and help me work why is she sitting there feet well the sit at his feet was to act like you were his disciple and women weren't disciples back then of anybody right and yet here she is sitting his feet and Jesus affirms her she's chosen that better part and that that's that's a pretty big deal so Martha was learning that Mary was appropriate to sit at the feet of Jesus and be a learner we're told that in Christ there is no male or female there was no slave or free no barbarian Scythian none of that no Greek no Jew there's there's the elevation of women and if we if we don't see that we don't see the main message of Scripture now as far as let's see first Corinthians 11 that's about women's hair being long or short I don't really see that as a sexist related issue I think that's about it what kind of appropriate way does God want us to represent our the image of God and again I'm not gonna offer an answer to that question for screen teens 11 it's I think it's something I've again I want to get into and study more but when we when we accused of being sexist what we're doing is we're reading our own trigger-happy attitudes into the scripture missing the forest through the trees and we're of course gonna walk out angry because we came in angry I think in that place I'm so I'd ask people to read it in context consider in the in the world that in which it really existed and look at the impact it had on men women race issues and all that and it's pretty amazing been Vitello says we have a will but we cannot choose our will if we can't be perfect on our own why are we deserving of punishment for being imperfect cool thank you for a question Ben we have a will but we can't choose our will well if we can't choose our will then we don't have a will do we I mean if I can't choose my will then I'm not I don't have a will I'm merely responding to pre-programmed desires to purely so I believe that that would not be true I would disagree with the first part of your statement I would say you do choose your will and I'll give you an example of one way you choose I'll give you two examples I guess one way I think you choose is you you choose like when I when I think okay I could drink this coffee or I could finish this sentence well I think I think I'll drink the coffee you know and I made a willful choice I was a determiner of the decision to drink that coffee or not so there's evidence that I chose what to do there I chose what to decide I'm the I'm the in it there's nothing that determined what I would determine it was me I'm the in stop there that's what libertarian freewill is now the next part you said the second example is is this the Bible says that when we choose sin we become more sinful and we've come more in bondage to sin when we choose to obey God we become renewed as Christians I become renewed in in my knowledge of Christ and it changes me from the inside out meaning that every decision I make when it's a moral choice it changes me and so I become more corrupt or I become you know more godly and so my my decision to sin isn't just a decision at that moment to sin it's a decision to yield myself more to sin so that later down the road you find yourself really stuck in sin and you ask yourself why can't I quit this sin why can't I overcome this sin and there's the two answers are one you need the you need the power of Christ you need the work of the Holy Spirit in your life to change you but the other answer is you chose this sin 10,000 times and now you're asking yourself why it's so hard to overcome you by your will have chosen bondage to this thing and so there's an element where even in in the things that we say I can't help it well you could help it there was 10,000 times I chose that this is Romans 7 where Paul says who's gonna deliver me from this body of death you know and that's where Jesus Christ comes in so yeah I hope that helps I hope that helps give you least some answers so why am i therefore deserving of punishment for being imperfect it's because I chose sin and and when you think about the phrase imperfect why am i deserving of punishment for being imperfect I wonder why we word it that way you know like I I could technically say why did that guy go to prison for 30 years just for being imperfect but really he like killed two people but I don't want to say he killed two people because then it's obvious why he's in prison so I say why is he going to prison for being imperfect well now it sounds like a travesty of justice I think if we're honest with ourselves we realized that were judged for our wicked sins that we knowingly did countless times and I am with you man I deserve judgment from God for my sins and there's only by the grace of Christ that I could be freed so I would say have a more honest try to have more honest sober look at your own sinful self and you'll realize your need for Jesus Andrew Graham says why is theism a better view than atheism and agnosticism well let me let me start with agnosticism and these are just my answers off the cuff you guys there's there's probably better answers and there's probably deeper answers but here's something that helped us get get talking about it right agnosticism isn't really a view it agnosticism it means I don't know that's all it means it means I don't know and so often the agnostic comes to the place where they just they criticize the atheist and they criticize the Christian or the theist and they just gonna criticize both views but they never settle on a view now the problem I have with this is that they're they're inevitably rejecting the truth because they're rejecting all views and one of those views has got to be right so there absolutely are rejecting truth okay so agnosticism is like who doesn't seem like a wise place to be for any length of time you are for sure wrong when you're agnostic now there's another side you could say well agnosticism is really the belief that you can't know the truth that nobody knows the truth and you can't know the truth and that kind of a Gnosticism I think requires a lot of justification you gotta prove to me that no one can know because I sure feel like I have a lot of good evidence to show that Christianity is true the God exists that Jesus really rose from the dead and so how can you tell me I can't know these things I'm determining the truth of Christianity the same way I determine the truth about other areas of life so that seems odd to me okay why is the theism better than atheism no here I might ruffle some feathers but I don't mean to do your atheists I'm not messing with you here I'm just trying to be honest I think that that theism belief in God has several and I should say quite a few really good reasons to support evidences or arguments to support theism and atheism has poor rebuttals to those arguments and it doesn't have any arguments any that I know of in support of atheism one could offer the problem of evil but I don't think it works and so so yeah theism has great arguments in support of it so God is God is the best explanation for why anything exists at all now oftentimes we hear atheists respond to that line of reasoning with that's a stupid question and I mean at Richard Dawkins this is what he says that's a dumb question that's a stupid question you shouldn't even ask why anything exists at all or you know Stephen Hawking who and these are brilliant men right but you can be foolish and brilliant at the same time Stephen Hawking says that that that philosophy is dead and that science answers all questions and these comments demonstrate an incredible philosophical lack of self-awareness that's an incredible Berenice in thinking the question when you have to say about a great argument for God's existence that it answers a question that's stupid to ask that tells me that your case is weak so God is the best explanation for why anything exists at all absolutely if the whole universe were just a paper clip I think it would be evidence for God because it's theirs we're these things are contingent things and God would be the ultimate eternal source I think God exists necessarily and we can run a series of arguments about God must exist by nature but by nature of who he is he must exist then there's things like the teleological argument or the evidence for design in the universe God is the best explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe both cosmically and biologically those types of things that we see you could run an argument from the resurrection of Christ that God is the best explanation for the historical facts around the person of Jesus Christ these are all good arguments you could run you know for God's existence for Christianity you could run their argument from prophecy from the Bible that the Bible has legitimate fulfilled prophecy revealing that it is the mind of God inspiring this work which validates God the Bible in Jesus all in one stroke atheism usually is supported by snide and snarky comments coming to the other side or often false fallacies you know or you say about a Christian view oh well that's circular reasoning and it's not really circular reasoning they just don't understand the argument very well and that that becomes difficult because once someone's laughing and mocking you it's difficult to tell them here's where you've got that technically wrong you know and it kind of kills the conversation but but there we I would say there's the advantage to that now there's another advantage of theism over atheism I will offer and that is that atheism is not sustainable for us as human beings atheism will destroy our sense of goodness it will destroy and now many atheists will have a very strong sense of goodness I'm not talking about them individually I'm not talking about the individual atheist but atheism its effect on the global community will have it bully will be a very terrible effect because it removes a real sense of human value and worth it removes a real sense of accountability for our actions and ultimate sense of accountability it removes a sense of purpose and meaning and it removes any justification for belief in moral duties that is a big deal atheism leads us down a scary scary path in society and eternally that is destructive on all levels in my opinion now this is ironic because many atheists they feel that they're being liberated by their atheism they feel that atheism is set them free and I get that I get where you're at you feel it set you free and the more you vilify Christianity in particular the more you feel good about theism but those vilifications of Christianity very often our distortions total twistings of what Christianity actually teaches or is and ends up being a kind of propaganda yeah so there's my answer to that intro Graham I hope it I hope it's helpful for you Colin says what would Mike say to Egyptology expert who comes to believe Jesus existed died rose and rains but refuses to give Jesus allegiance because of Jesus's belief in the historical Exodus wow that that's an interesting question so the hypothetical is you've got this expert in Egyptology and he's convinced because of his research in Egyptology that the Exodus never happened historically and now he also was convinced that Jesus really died and rose from the dead but he will reject Jesus now because he because he thinks Jesus believed in the the Exodus well I think Jesus probably did believe in the historical Exodus and I think the historical Exodus has really happened but he's gonna look at me and say but Mike you don't know what I know you don't know what I know Mike and I would say there are times where our own worldview we we have things that we think are true that conflict with each other there's times where this can happen right and when that happens you need to go with whatever is the you need to sort of pick the thing that outweighs the other things and you need to go with that or lest you fall into agnosticism forever and end up rejecting truth for guaranteed that's what the agnosticism does so you're convinced Jesus died and rose bodily from the dead but you're gonna reject him because you think he believed in something that I with my profession as a historian you know Egyptologist I say did not happen that just seems unwise to me now let's suppose that let's put the shoe on the other foot let's suppose that I have a profession I don't but let's say I'm a philosopher of morality of ethics you know and I I do this all day long it's my bread and butter and I'm convinced that some of the stuff that happened the Old Testament that God commanded was immoral yet I am also convinced that prophecy and the resurrection and the arguments for God's existence are all true so I believe God exists I believe that he must be the God of the Bible yet he commanded things that I think are immoral I think a better response would be Wow God probably knows better than me like let me let me apply this now to the you to be top Egyptologist dear Egyptologists do you think you think to yourself I really know my field Jesus didn't know my field and I'm a professional in it and I have concluded something that Jesus thinks is true is actually false now I want you to think of Jesus as perhaps a more reliable source than yourself and think if he really is who he says he is and he really died and rose again and he says the exodus happened then this might give me a reason to think that my own research is problematic and you as an Egyptologist have been trained to take your research and hold it all tentatively waiting for more information well I would say Jesus is the better Egyptologist and he should be trusted but even if you don't follow that reasoning you the idea of rejecting Christianity knowing is true but then rejecting it because of a secondary issue seems really foolish to me let's see Lemon difficult ask another question in Genesis 3 and keep asking your questions guys we can definitely get some more today so yeah please put your questions in the live chat thanks for joining me I'm not gonna mock you I'm not gonna make funny I want sincere questions and I might even do a few trick questions that come my way because sometimes they're fun to use all right let me difficult says in Genesis 3 the serpent tells Eve the fruit would not kill her but would open her eyes and that's what the fruit did why do Christians call this interaction a deception or a lie by the serpent so the actually let's let's look at the passage let's look at this passage and we'll go to it all right here it is the the Genesis passage hmm now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field but the Lord God had made he said to the woman to God actually say you shall not eat of any tree in the garden and the woman said to the serpent we may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden but God said you shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden neither shall you touch it lest you die so there's the there's the danger you're gonna die but the serpent said to the woman you will not surely die for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be open and you will be like God knowing good and evil and then she she sees that it's it's fruitful it looks desirable to make one wise and all that so she goes ahead and eats it now did did Satan really lie well Satan did what in my opinion is the typical version of lying which is where you take something that's true and you twist it somewhat and that was the nature of what he did what he affirmed was was was sort of true it's gonna make you wise it wasn't really wisdom but it would give them the knowledge of good and evil I wouldn't call that so much wisdom it were given the knowledge of good and evil the experiencial knowledge of having rebelled against God and it would open the floodgates of all kinds of sin but the the big lie in what he said is when he pretended that she wouldn't die oh you're not gonna die he says to her sorry I gotta grab this you're not gonna die but know she does die and her in Adam died and they died immediately in losing relationship with God and they died eventually in physical death and that whole thing started at the moment of the eating of the fruit they were banned from eating the tree of from the Tree of Life and so then they died so ya know God was God was right Satan used something that sounded true to try to deny something else that was also true and that seems to be like the normal way of Lies and that's the nature of sin so often for us we think we can have our cake and eat it too with sin I'm longing for relationship and so Satan wants you to think that you can fornicate to achieve those relationships you can you can fornicate and that's going to get you what you want and in the end it's that lifestyle of fornication that leads to the destruction of your future marriage leads to cohabitation which ends up in all kinds you know radically increased separation rates even though they don't have statistic on divorce rates for those there's an example where Satan's gonna lie to you oh you're feeling down and you want to feel better just use drugs because you know when you get high on drugs you're gonna you're gonna feel better but the long-term effect of drugs is you end up feeling worse even though a short-term you felt better so there's a truth in in the lie alright from eBay six says my brother doesn't believe in doesn't believe the Bible arguing that there are much older religions Christian Christianity copies ie the virgin birth and other aspects that are the same what would you say um this this is when I was talking about some of those most common objections are some of the worst one of the objections of Christianity is along these lines Jesus is a a repeat version of pagan gods and Osiris just like Jesus he had twelve disciples and he baptized people and he died and rose again on the third day he was even born December 25th and Mithras and he was also born December 25th and and and he was born of a virgin and he died and rose again in three days and he turned water to wine and all this kind of stuff this stuff's really popular on the Internet and we've got to do a better job as Christians blasting this insanity out of the water it's completely and utterly false it's totally fabricated and one of the best ways you could do this that you could ask the person to prove it Oh Osiris is all these things prove it please go to your mother and ask him to prove it and maybe before you ask him to prove it to really take advantage of this opportunity you tell him what if Christianity is not a copy of pagan religions what if Christianity is not a copy what does that mean because he's trying to say it's a copy therefore it's false well if it's not a copy does that help him see that it's more likely true and then you proceeded to show him it's not a copy one of the only cults that seems to have actual connection to Christianity is the Mithras cult and they they did have a connection to Christian practices but it seems when you look at it historically that though the Mithra cult was around before Christianity that the practice is where they were copying Christianity where there were like Christianity they came after Christianity became popular so it looks more like this cult adapted their practices to copy Christianity after Christianity became popular not the other way around and so that's pretty significant yeah so they'll go down this road in lots of different ways some people will try to say Genesis is an original doesn't have any original content because it has similarities between it and say that in Numa leash but in reality have to look at the differences and you realize that Genesis is proclaiming things that were unpro in those religions that were going on at the time so yeah I hope that that helps you got to chase this stuff down chase this stuff down actually the video on Christmas believe it or not where I deal with I think it's called like May this is about know something about mids about Christmas Christmas or myth miss or something weird like that I forget what it titled it but I get into some of these issues you know Mithra and Dionysius and all that kind of stuff yeah asked me to prove it ask him to prove it because it's not true Riley Smith says how do you reconcile the disputed letters of Paul do you believe translations like the NLT ESV etc are still infallible compared to the original Greek manuscripts well okay to pretty different questions here so how to reconcile the disputed letters of Paul what she's referring to or he Riley is referring to here is the question about Pauline authorship of all the letters that Paul wrote Paul wrote a number of letters in a New Testament right but the question is did he really write them all and some scholars would say in fact a lot of scholars would say that several of those letters Paul didn't really write here I think it's just the results probably of scholarly bias over the years against the Bible for a long time if you disagreed with a traditional Christian view it was considered good scholarship or at least that's how it appears to a layman like myself and so there's sometimes where scholarships just wrong on things and the all of these problems get resolved if Paul simply used an amanuensis in his writings in some cases so here he's using someone to help him write these things down he looks over the straw sure of the letter that kind of thing other times they're there they're making a big deal out about small stuff like Paul didn't usually use this word it uses it in this letter not that letter therefore it's not Paul it's like come on I mean people that's not people right people sometimes use words they don't normally use so I do the same thing you know it helps to increase perspicuity hey perspicuity so yeah now I I haven't done a whole lot of homework on this but who has this a guy named Darrell Bock Darrell Bock has done some work on the on the letters of Paul and you can and who wrote them that kind of thing and there's a debate between him and Bart Ehrman who promotes the idea that there's forgeries in the New Testament and you can catch this on the unbelievable radio program which I think that I think they probably have it on their YouTube channel now as well Darrell Bock Bart Airman forged if you search that term you'll get it so check that out Riley do I believe translations are still infallible well I mean they're infallible in as much as they represent the original writing there's always going to be a question in with translations if if you're accurately representing what the original said so I I don't know how else to answer that question I think they're think they're reliable I think the translations are reliable Eric did door tip Dorf says Jesus says about false prophets by their fruit you will recognize them Matthew 7 16 we can see fruit in the lives of many Mormons bhai is etc how do you explain that sorry for posting twice Paul I accept your apology Eric the fruit of okay when Jesus says by their fruit you shall know them he's talking specifically about false prophets not individuals why is that significant well if he's talking about end of individuals then you would examine and anybody who seemed like a good person you would think maybe they're maybe they're saved or something maybe they're a Messenger of God or something but that's not what Jesus is doing he's saying by their fruit you will know them whether they're good or false prophets so when I look at Mormonism the fruit on when a test is the fruit of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young that's the fruit I want to test I want to test it through the leaders when I look at Islam for instance I want to test the fruit of Muhammad that's the fruit I want to test its the founders and leaders when look at your home as witnesses I want to look at Rutherford and Hayes I would look at those guys and I want to see the fruit of their ministries and the fruit of their behaviors and the way they live their actual lives if it's consistent with the things they proclaimed and so for instance Joseph Smith and Mormonism Joseph Smith would go up to a man and tell him that the man should should leave his wife and give his wife to Joseph Smith to be another one of Joseph Smith's wives what kind of fruit does that sound like to you say you're following justice Smith you think he's a prophet of God and he comes up to me says hey hey Eric Eric God's telling me that he wants me to marry your wife and you're gonna have great treasures in heaven God's gonna bless you but you need to give me your wife that's called bad fruit I mean this is this is shameful to divorce the adultery all of the above this is wicked fruit that's that's Joseph Smith Brigham Young said if you don't practice polygamy you can't enter into the highest level of heaven these are the founders of the Mormon Church so there's the fruit Baha'i I haven't done a lot of study on Baha'i on the other hand there's there's plenty of people in different religions who seem to live good moral lives but one of the one of the biggest indications that something's wrong with us is when we're rejecting God himself and so if I think but that person is such a good person I'm like wolf they're so good why are they rejecting God think about it this is kind of significant yeah so now I don't think you have to go and find secret sins in everybody but but yeah you want to measure the fruit of ministries of religions you know you need to look at the founders of those religions now look at Jesus I compared the fruit of Jesus's life who lives self-sacrificial II who gave himself for others who never did anything seemingly for himself there's good fruit yeah another question from women difficult says how does secular marriage between two people of the same sex or gender affect Christianity why do Christians spent so much time advocating against something that isn't relevant to them well why is it relevant to anybody then if it's not relevant to Christians I mean this is just honest question if and a lot of Christians don't they don't even talk about the issue but but let's say same-sex marriage why do they why did why is it relevant to anybody why do we have to ledge late that everyone has to accept it and everyone has to support it if it's not relevant to us why is it like a baker you know has to make a bake that supports same-sex marriage or else he's gonna get sued 50 times in a row that's happening again the guys getting sued again right now I mean it seems to me that the issue is being pushed from one side on on to the other not the other way around so how does it affect Christianity it doesn't affect Christianity it won't change Christianity at all I think it's I think it creates more sin and more harm in our culture and that grieves my heart and I think that especially when I see Christians who are going on the road of supporting same-sex marriage I go I think you're confused and I understand being confused let me give an example to confusion the question of same-sex marriage these are really about equal rights or is it about the definition of marriage here's a big divide on the topic those who think it's about equal rights they're constantly you know making the case that we should have the same rights for straight people as we do for gay people and I would agree with that in principle I'm like well yeah we should have the same rights well then they go well then why aren't you supporting same-sex marriage and I go well because it's an issue of the definition of marriage not an issue of equal rights ah so the definition of marriage what's that about the definition of marriage would say that marriage simply is the union of a man and a woman a man and a woman such that could potentially create children and that this is the foundation of all society think about this this all of society is built on this relationship all of society and to change the definition of something that's at the core of society and is is beautiful and good and righteous and holy to include something that's actually that's not at the foundation of society that is in fact in and of itself a distortion of God's created order that is a problem that is a problem but people act like it's a personal attack like I'm mad at a gay person because they want to get married or something I'm like no I'm saying God has a better plan for you than this and I don't want to have all of society all of society which they're doing now going down the road of affirming something that's harmful to even the people that they think they're helping and that doesn't that's not a good thing it's not a godly but I'm not throwing stones over the issue so yeah now I why do Christians spent so much time advocating about it I don't think they do advocate about it even enough to be honest we don't talk about it enough I think where people are here sins are intimidated by society there's intimidated by culture the amount of hatred I've received for the videos where I deal with homosexuality is intense people who track me down my purse they'll track down my personal social media just to curse me out and call me names and and I'm like I got nothing but love for you man I just think you're doing something that's wrong so I hope that helps happy Earth bites I used to believe in the inerrancy of Scripture for 30 years but no longer do why do some Christians believe this doctrine is important why believe it prophecies don't indicate inerrancy in a sense prophecies you're right don't wouldn't indicate inerrancy I take it you're a Christian though I am hoping to get questions mostly from non-christians here but some there's here's a couple different reasons to believe in an errand see one would be that you think that if scripture is inspired it's automatically inerrant like if God directed you to write that then it's gonna be something that whether will it will it will not have where it will not have errors so that's just like a philosophical idea it's like a boom one leads to the other another reason to believe inerrancy would be to think that Jesus himself likely did and so you can do a whole study on Jesus and what did heat what was his view of Scripture why is it important because once someone says that there's errors in the Bible you have to ask yourself well which ones are they and how do you give me the key give me the magic key for determining where the errors are and where the errors aren't and all of a sudden you start people start this is what happens when people tonight and Aaron see they sometimes go down the road of inventing a new version of Christianity just to suit themselves and they feel they can dismiss portions of scripture and teachings in the Bible because well it's got errors in it and so then they become the inerrant one and the Bible is the errant one and that that does happen so there's a good as a safety and believing in Harran see but if I reject the inerrancy I'll still be a Christian I will have trouble with certain passages of scripture and I would have confusion about how to read certain things but I would still believe in Jesus Christ I think it's a tragedy for those who reject Jesus because of secondary issues skeptic review says what's your response to that Ephesians was a forgery Ephesians uses longer sentences than in Paul's other epistles yeah well you know I think that it's not a big deal and I'm not a linguist right but to me it's not a big deal that Paul wrote in a really long sentence in Ephesians chapter one and didn't do it the same way and say cold maybe he did in Colossians I don't know um but I didn't do it in say first Corinthians I don't think that's that big of a deal and I think there could have been multiple reasons why he would have done that maybe he was just on a roll you know you ever been just writing something and you're like on a roll you know I don't know so anyway I just I reject that now part of the reason why I reject it is because of my Christian views it's that I do believe the Bible is God's inspired Word and it's a cohesive whole and that the feedings and Colossians and all these books are part of that scripture and it seems it seems to go radically against that to think that they're forgeries so I'm inclined to reject the idea that they're forgeries but I'm not inclined to do so on blind faith I may actually inclined to do so based upon principles I believe that God really did inspire the scriptures and give it to me as a whole the idea that it's containing forgeries just strikes totally against what has already been confirmed to me to be true but I don't have videos teaching on this because I would want to get into more of the nitty-gritty details if I was to do it sorry I'm still getting over being sick I'm feeling a lot better than I was though let me difficult another question I sometimes call myself agnostic Calvinist if God is real he hasn't selected me oh that's interesting of you if he wants me to be saved and I desire to understand him but I'm unconvinced by the Bible where do I stand thank you so much for your question III really I just would say I appreciate it it can be embarrassing to put your question out for an online audience like this so thank you for doing that if God is real he hasn't selected me I think that well what do I say you know honestly I would love to just have a whole conversation with you and listen to you unpack your views and what you're thinking and all these things that would be my preference I wish I could answer to a lot more of this but time is what it is so yeah let me just see if I can what I can glean from your question if he wants me to be saved and I desire to understand him but I'm unconvinced by the Bible where do I stand okay so it sounds like you're saying in let me I mean hope I characterize you right that you're saying I I want to understand God I desire to know God and let me go a step further and say I hope this is your view I hope that you're saying this that you're saying and if God is real I want to I want to follow him I want to yield my life to him and I want to surrender everything I've got over to God because he's the one who deserves all the glory now if you could if you could say that that's a really healthy place to be and if you're in that place then I would say just keep seeking God I mean sincerely like pray get on your knees before the Lord and seek the Lord and read the Bible and don't worry about the secondary issues just go to Jesus and look at who Jesus is and and see what the Lord does in your heart but know this that that we are a mixed bag of psychological mix just mush and our own motives are hard for us to discern and figure out and this is the case for me and I know it's the case for you too what the Bible tells us about our relationship with God is that when people reject God it's usually because they embrace sin so I would I would I'm gonna go out this in a pastoral sense and I'm gonna ask you to consider in your in your life in your heart are there particular sins that you would be loathe to give up if you found out Christianity was true and maybe maybe that is creating a problem for you finding out that Christianity is true are there certain aspects of submitting your life to God that just really bug you if that's the case then that might be the reason why you can't see a reason to submit your life to God or to believe that there's a possibility there now there's but the same time like Eve when she hated the fruit she was deceived she really believed the serpent she thought and I believe the servant so there's elements of deception that can go on in there so yeah um seek the Lord seek the Lord this this fatalistic view that well I guess I'm just not chosen I think that that's a total cop-out I think it's a total cop-out like you have no choice in your life like you have no free will like you're not accountable for the life you live and the choices you make and you're putting it on God and I'm not a Calvinist so I don't I don't have to support those views I would say seek the Lord seek the Lord what what could the harm be mariahlynn says advice for someone who finds the arguments for Christianity somewhat persuasive but also seems to fall short of having actual faith still has severe doubts and reservations Moriah my advice to you would be boy I wish I could just hang out with you guys I read these comments and I'm like man I wish we could just get lunch but um but obviously I can't get lunch with 600 people so Mariah let me say a few things write down your most serious doubts and pursue answers to those questions I say write them down because sometimes in writing them down we find out that we thought we had more than we did have and there's really and you write in your most serious ones so you realize there's really just these three or maybe it's these two or maybe it's just this one that's these are the real ones that really get me write those things down now once you get them on paper step 2 is going to be this ask yourself do these things really give me a warrant to reject all the reasons I have over here to believe in Christ maybe you should even write those down to the persuasive reasons to believe in Christianity and write those to uh nask yourself do my doubts justify rejecting the things that seem to be telling me Christianity is true I'm asking you to process this and work through it another step I'll tell say is this to actually spiritually pursue God well you're where you're praying and you're seeking God you're not doing it so you can get an emotional high you're doing it because you want to understand and know the truth and if you're on that path I think you're in a very good place so there's a couple things that I would encourage you with I hope I hope that they help and everybody pray for Mariah would you Nixie says doesn't the first 11 chapters of the Bible seem ridiculous like spiritual beings having sex with women and producing Giants and humans living nearly a thousand years old yeah I wouldn't actually agree with that rendition of the first 11 chapters of Genesis I do have a video where I talk about the Nephilim and that that's what in Genesis 6 the whole Giants and that kind of question for one thing to me a Samoan is giant and so we say giant we think we're thinking of like TV giants they've got to be like 40 feet tall or something like that and that's not necessarily what it's even saying so there were big people you know and so um yeah and in the words that are used they're used later as well to refer to the Anakim they were just there were big peeps man they were big guys and they were scary to the Israelites they were like we were like grasshoppers in our sight well they weren't like 70 feet tall people they were just a lot bigger than the Israelites were so yeah I think there's part of that there Genesis 1 through 11 is another one of those sections where I want to really go back to like I privately obsess over Genesis 1 through 11 and I will I believe it I believe it's God's holy inspired Word but I've heard various ways of interpreting it and ways of justifying those interpretations some of which are dumb and some of which seem pretty convincing and so I look at that and I go gosh I don't know the right way to handle something like much of it I think like I can interpret just fine but some aspects of it so regarding answering your specific questions those are some of the things I have questions about although it's not ruining my faith in God or my faith in Christ and I think it's perfectly acceptable for a Christian to say there's questions I have that I don't know the answers to that doesn't mean Christianity is not true and this is what sometimes non-believers think they're they they really think that if if I can find one passage in the Bible that a Christian can't answer answer me on then therefore Christianity's proven false and a way to just reflect on that for a moment if you're a non-believer that doesn't really make sense does it in fact it's kind of expected I'm reading an ancient ancient work and I'm reading it with with oftentimes you're just reading it you have no tools to help you understand the passage in the place and so of course there's gonna be sections of Scripture where you're like wondering what does that mean what did that mean and it's in its culture in its time how does it apply into my life there's gonna be some challenges that are understandable there yeah on the flip side if if it came down to where you say I'm gonna take a 7-day young earth creationist they literally lived all those ages were quite literal I would still trust the scriptures and I would still be a Christian because even though I realize there's a lot of scientific challenges to those views most of those scientific questions are over my head and they're over your head if you're honest you don't really understand plate tectonics now you don't really understand radiometric dating like you could say a few things about it right I could say carbon dating and potassium-argon dating and Hailey oat radio radio halos halos and zircon crystals and I could but do you really understand that stuff I would still trust Scripture and just say I have some unreconciled issues that I need to work through being very blunt and honest with you guys bonzi says is it forbidden to have more than one wife if you follow Christianity in my country South Africa it is legal in some parts to have more than one wife this is a question I get from my people I think that the gospel was meant to go out into all cultures and some of those cultures were polygamist and so what I see in the New Testament is affirmations of one man one woman that's like that's like God's ideal this is God's calling upon us Jesus affirms it one man one woman the two shall become one and it seems like when you add another woman in there isn't that adultery you call it marriage but isn't it are you cheating on both of them really with it with each other that seems like it to me but but Jesus affirms one man one woman he never does anything that opens the door to polygamy as far as I can see I'm in the Old Testament the descriptors refute polygamy especially for the kings of Israel they specifically say do not multiply wives they're like told not to do this in the New Testament again and this is really interesting in Paul's writings he talks about leadership in the church in qualifications for leadership in the book of first Timothy and he says that an elder must be the husband of one wife that's interesting phrase and there's a debate on it what does he mean the husband of one wife does he mean that the guy couldn't have a polygamous relationship and it seems as though my take on it I could be wrong my understanding is that Paul's saying there were those who were perhaps polygamists who had become Christians and now they're following Jesus and yet they've got two wives three wives and yet they're saved and yet they're in this weird situation what did they do next I don't see a clear answer in Scripture should is he supposed to divorce two of them well what are they going to do now I think this creates a really complicated hard question and I don't know how to answer it for everybody but Paul does lay down but those guys can't be leaders in the church because there's something they fundamentally done that is hijacked and damaged the beautiful picture of Christ in the church that there is in one man and one woman being married and so I think I would embrace someone who was a polygamist becoming a Christian but if they were like I want to serve the Lord I would like no man you're breaking the example in this sacred thing called marriage you're breaking the example of Christ in the church so you're not you don't even qualify for a leadership because of that situation so I know that's not the full answer but there's a few thoughts for you and I do hope it helps I got another question here from purple Sparrow there's good evidence that an all-powerful being exists what is the evidence for a natural for the nature of this all-powerful being and all-powerful being would have absolute power to deceive for instance great question thank you for asking so this is I find really interesting so there's some who go down this road they kind of grant hey so there's a there's a God okay I'll grant that there's good evidence for God but why don't I just think he's just tricking me with all this Christian stuff like maybe Jesus rose from the dead like as a joke maybe it's just all a big trick and I will offer a few responses to that one would be unless I have good reason to think it's a trick I think I should believe those things which seem to be true right now this is like a really good rule of life it's like simple practical rule of life unless I have a reason to think I'm hallucinating that a car is driving towards me I should just believe it really is you know and then get out of and rather than but what if it's a trick so like that's not a really liveable principle in life to think what if it's a trick like I can't live it consistently so it seems like I'm especially applying it just to God because perhaps perhaps I'm using it to avoid some conclusions I'm not interested in I want to defeat Christianity is what it sounds like sometimes but there's other reasons I could support this and that is what do we know about this being this God well we know that he is good right because God is God is the is the grounding for moral goodness anything is good because God is good so if God's very nature is good if that's if that's if it's true the moral argument is true that the God explains moral values and duties then he can't be a liar like he literally can't be a liar as scripture says God cannot lie that's like a deep philosophical claim I think so he can't be a liar and therefore when he raises Christ from the dead and he delivers us his word this can't be a lie it must be the truth because in his nature he is true and he is good so that so someone of these what I'm saying here is one of these theistic arguments that doesn't draw from the Bible it just draws from human experience that moral values and duties we perceive these were like yeah moral values and duties are real and then we say well God's the best explanation for those well if he is then he's not lying to you then he's not this giant liar there's another line of reasoning that might help support bringing you over bringing you over man come and come to Christ I pray that's that's what I'm hoping for hold on here hold on what did I just get I got some questions so I think actually I think that's it for our questions from non-believers to at least the ones that AJ sent me and I'm gonna answer a couple questions from Christians right now because I just want to get to these because I just I love you guys and have a chance to maybe hopefully bless you from Kathy Michaels she says if you're pastors total focus is on divine healing and wants to call his church a healing center for the purpose of bringing in the lost should I stay or find a different church Kathy I don't think I'm qualified to answer that question I'm so sorry if I was at your church I would be asking the same question as you do I want to be here this seems problematic you know I don't know about this place where what's what's the direction you're going in and and I would say just be really slow to decide and as you decide if you do decide to leave think about the best way to do so what's the wise and God honoring way to do so and don't just disappear think about how to honor Christ in how you do this if you decide to leave and I pray God gives you wisdom Cathy may God give you great wisdom from it's coming around again says does once do once saved always saved and lordship salvation people agree with one another and only argue over semantics once they've always saved is kind of a different issue than lordship salvation I don't like the phrase lordship salvation a lot of people would classify me as lordship salvation but I reject the the phraseology I don't like I think that repentance is part of the gospel I think that the repentance is inextricably connected to faith when you believe in Jesus repentance is implicit in that because you're turning from sin to God so that's what I would say so people call that lordship salvation I think that might be the wrong term for it once saved always saved as a belief that once someone has turned their trust in Christ they can never lose our salvation some people who think you can lose your salvation they don't think you lose it through sin they think you lose it throw up a pasta sizing the gospel like where you you reject the gospel you believe in Jesus so you're saying well you reject Jesus you choose to reject God and that and so it's not like you sin so much you lost it rather you just chose you don't you said you don't want it anymore I don't take a side on that particular issue not currently anyway soli Deo Gloria says is Mike going to make anymore worship songs I enjoy listening to them and praising God last night that's awesome also channels grown by quite a bit very quickly I know we're gonna hit probably $100,000 $100,000 yeah right 100,000 subscribers probably by the next time I put up a video probably by next week it's pretty exciting that was my I was actually my hopeful goal this year was to reach a hundred thousand by the end of the year and I'm kind of blown away yeah so worship songs I have some worship songs are out there you guys can see some if you look up just put Michael in your worship you'll probably find it on my You Tube channel have a playlist as well of some songs I I don't know if I'll make anymore it's just not my focus so maybe I'm not as good at it as I am at of things but I'm glad it blesses you Doolin says how would you explain to non-christians that we as humans are represented by Adam and thus inheriting Adam sinful nature is not is isn't this unfair or inconsistent that's a tough one I mean I can tell people that Adam is my actual ancestor and the choices he makes affect me I can also tell them that God specifically appointed Adam as the representative of the human race in the decision to eat of the fruit he therefore brought us all into the fall I can tell those things and those things I think are true but how do I make him feel good about it well I don't know I mean who's gonna feel good about the idea that somebody else made a decision that affected you I think Romans the book of Romans helps us out a little bit not in that it denies Adams representation it speaks of Adams representation but it says but everyone died even those who didn't sin according to the likeness of Adam why and it goes on to explain because we've all sinned and fall short of God's glory and so here's where I'll just tell the person look you've made your own choices your you have chosen to sin you have chosen to rebell against God and then I can try to tie in hopefully the fact that Jesus is our new representative that just as Adam in the garden represents all of us eating the fruits of Jesus on the cross represents all of us dying for the punishment of our sin so that we might be restored into new life so if you don't like Adam representing you well then how can you accept Jesus representing you I mean leave see there are two sides of the same coin Adam is a setup for Jesus Adam is a preparation for the message of the cross the the tree in the garden is to get us ready for the tree at Golgotha that's that's the idea right here and so I see in Adam an important element there because it's it's communicating to us that we've got that we've got a representative in Christ and so that's an important element there let's see here first Corinthians 1:18 the question is and I don't know that's the name of the person or if there's questions about that passage how do I explain to deists the divinity of scriptures most reject them because men wrote it how do I refute it oh okay so yeah though so some people say how on earth do I believe that the Bible is God's Word when it was written by men and these are what I would call again common objections that are actually really bad why is that because Christians throughout time have always affirmed that men wrote the Bible and some women write that like proverbs proverbs 31 that's that was by a woman so we have we have human authors in the scriptures how can we affirm that God God wrote it well we're never affirming God physically wrote the Bible that's never what we've been saying so you're refuting something that Christians aren't claiming what we're claiming is that men were moved by the Holy Spirit when they wrote the scriptures and that somehow God was using human vessels not like automatons where he took over their bodies but rather he was using them in some fashion and he was inspiring them to write what he wanted them to write in some cases like with Isaiah he's like Isaiah here's the message and use of a verbatim word and Isaiah writes it down other times like say the book of Philemon paul's writing a letter to - this this this Anisa --mess or about an isthmus to this slave owner in the first century called Philemon to let him go and receive him as a brother and to elevate his status and this is inspired ultimately by the Holy Spirit so the question we should ask and I like to start with this question here's what I want to say to people I love asking this question I say let's pretend that the Bible is inspired by God how would you know and they go what because they've never even thought about this question before I say let's say the Bible is inspired by God I put a different way what would you look for in the Bible as evidence that it was inspired by God and not just human authors and now I start getting them thinking and guess what that's my series evidence for the Bible I have a playlist send it to your friend this is the series evidence for the Bible where we go through prophecy as as evidence that there's knowledge in the scriptures things recorded information in the Bible that wasn't known couldn't have been known to the human authors themselves they had to have had some some sort of supernatural knowledge given to them to be able to write these things so that's the direction I would go another different direction to go as you go from the resurrection of Jesus to the inspiration in the Bible right you say well if you believe Jesus rose well then you're gonna believe in who Jesus is Jesus affirmed the inspiration of Scripture so on his authority you can argue for the inspiration of Scripture that's in a different direction you can take let's see tests tests something monalee says if certain cessationists believe that god doesn't speak anymore is this blasphemy are they saved how can one serve God and not hear from them when scriptures suggest God does speak well I think that uh in my view associations could have the Lord minister some truth to them they just wouldn't say that it was revelation of some kind and so I think it ends up being semantics in some cases where I'll give an example somebody you guys are not gonna like this example so I apologize ahead of time I'm just illustrating a point I'm not supporting this I have a friend who he's he's charismatic you know he believes in the holy spirit can speak through him and he was leading worship and he was at a church that was cessationist and they were like we don't want none of that God's telling me to tell you stuff happening on our stage and so he's like I respect that so instead he just prayed Lord you know I I pray that you would help us to know and then he communicated in prayer the thing that he felt the Holy Spirit was trying to ask him to tell the people and so now I'm not saying that that was a smart thing to do but it was an interesting angle he took and to me it gets at something which is when a cessationist is being led by the Holy Spirit they will just call it something different a little different then when the charismatic is being led by the Holy Spirit and so I I don't consider it like some black famous type issue there are some times where it will be an issue in a problem but I think that I want to be as gracious as possible to my brothers in the cessationist camp I do think they're led of the Spirit and I think that they they just will call it something a little different then I would as someone who's more charismatic Nixie says isn't it unfair to be born predisposed to Adam and Eve's sin like the curse of being born sinners if I understand it correctly and I kind of already understand I've already explained that but let me add an element since we're bringing it up again and that is it's not really right for you or me to demand that we should have been born a certain way like God you should have made me born perfect with no temptations of any kind that's just not how I should have been made I shouldn't have been made with sin and full temptations and I've been wronged because I am a person who has sinful temptations I think that that is a an indefensible position morally speaking so I would challenge the position and say don't go there so by the way here's the cat cam I can't just joined us so um I'll give it to you guys there's moxie there's yes all right there's your cat cam moment yeah so anyway just for my cat people watch all the viewers just click off right then okay I'm gonna answer I say two more questions we're gonna call it a night thank you so much - my Ma's for being there I love you guys and I really appreciate you being there and helping me with this channel I couldn't do it alone and yeah so Ethan Roger says hey Mike how do you read romans 1:16 that the power of God is what saves those who believe or the gospel is the power of God and what saves those who believe or both what's Paul saying interesting question let's look at the passage I'm not sure if I understand the question to be honest but I'll do my best to try to give a thoughtful answer from not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes let me read the question again we can all try to be on the same page as Ethan here how do you read Romans 1:16 and he gives a couple options that the power of God is what saves those who believe or the gospel is the power of God and what saves those who believe or both I guess my answer will be both my answer will be both it is it is the power of God the gospel is is is how the Avenue through which God's power will save those who believe it the gospel they'll gain access to that power through the gospel and also I guess actually maybe I wouldn't say I'm just thinking about this as we do this actually I might not say that the gospel in and of itself the news in and of itself is what saves you because I just well in a sense that's true in another sense I don't want to separate the gospel from how the gospel becomes powerful through the cross and through the work of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit and so these are all together so it's all together they're the power of God to save I hope that was thoughtful for you and then Shawn Frey says if God is not the author of confusion then why are there so many interpretations of Scripture oh thank you Shawn for asking this question you know why Shawn because so many people have the same question it comes up a lot and I want to try to answer it here off the top of my head but but I'm glad to have an opportunity to talk about it so there's a lot of different interpretations of the Bible and that in and of itself that phrase in and of itself is a little bit tricky because it's not as though you have one interpretation of the whole Bible and then someone else has a different interpretation that's exclusive to yours of the whole Bible and then we have millions of these that are out there all mutually exclusive interpretations of the Bible as a whole because that's totally not the case in fact when you examine it more carefully you will see that throughout Christian history there has been real consistency on things like who Jesus is what he did on the cross arm you know sort of the the essentials mere christianity that these things are there's so much agreement on those issues that i would we say we can't say everyone has different interpretations of the Bible another side of this is denominations a lot of denominations are out there but a lot of them are disagreeing on secondary issues secondary issues like church government should it be elder LED or congregation LED I mean I wouldn't call this a different interpretation of the Bible these are just different forms of church government now there are passages of Scripture they will debate on and they will debate on those but in some cases it's not even about the scripture it's about tradition and that's kind of a big deal a lot of people their issues aren't the Bible their issues are all this extra tradition that's outside the Bible and so in Catholicism this is the case there's a ton of tradition outside the scripture that influences Catholic teaching and belief and these things have little to do with the Bible and so one of the forgive me I'm still I still got a cold here one of the issues with with the debate between Catholics and Christians is when when a Catholic and Christian discuss something do we talk about just the Bible like say the I say Catholic and Christian I'm not saying all Catholics aren't Christians or something like that I just have to have terminology to talk about this stuff so the Catholic non-catholic when they have a discussion sometimes the non Catholic wants to say hey show me the papacy in the Bible alone and they're in the Catholics I mean like a legit Catholic can honestly say I don't even have to show it to you in the Bible I got an interest radition so here they're not debating over the Bible they're debating over tradition yeah so there's one of the issues as well so I would say we have large agreement over various things and so that it's not like mutually exclusive views of the Bible all spread throughout Christianity another aspect of it is this humans are humans man like you know the way we are of course if I get my ax to grind on some passage or some idea you know of course you're gonna have with modern feminism going on you're gonna have people reinterpreting passages about women that's just what happens because of a cultural issue so we're gonna see these sorts of things happen and we we can we can chalk that up not to the confusion in the Bible but to human confusion about the Bible and we have arguments and confusion about everything and every aspect of everything bring up an issue where you can get two experts in the field on any topic and they can debate about foundational issues in their field it doesn't mean their fields totally muddy and unclear it's like a human quality to be able to argue about everything in anything no matter what the evidence says and so there'd be my that would be my answer to you yeah if you just have a plain reading of scripture most passages become pretty obvious and some are still debatable and I wonder if I'm understanding correctly myself but I don't think that invalidates the Bible as a whole so I hope that helps you guys thank you so much for joining me what massive turnout today for this this non-christians asking me questions I really appreciate you especially the non-christian to put their questions out there thank you so much I hope that your question was answered in a way that helps you and I really hope it helps someone else who's just listening in and that it leads you closer to Jesus Christ because I mean I believe I can say it's straight-faced I'm not selling nothing I believe that Jesus is the way the truth and the life and he's our access to God God who loves you who made you and who was made a way for you to know him has paid for your sin that you might be restored into relationship with him through Jesus Christ I mean I hope that you celebrate Christmas this this year being able to actually celebrate Christ so yeah thank you guys so much for being here and for joining me for the stream god bless you

Channel: Mike Winger

Views: 151,837

Rating: 4.878788 out of 5

Keywords: non-Christians ask me questions, answers for non-Christians, apologetics, mike winger Q&A, apologetics q and a, tuesday livestream, answering questions from nonbelievers, answering questions from unbelievers

Id: mE7rCB2Wwy4

Length: 78min 30sec (4710 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 03 2019