Apologetics and Evidence

NDErs (i. e. people who have claimed to have had a   Near Death Experience ) often report that when they go to Heaven, they frequently see and recognize people such as friends and family members. It is often also reported that when they were communicating with friends and relatives, they realized that they weren’t speaking English, but that they were telepathically speaking to one another.   It seems it would be impossible to have communication with others without learning every language that has ever existed under the sun, but since heaven is a perfect place, [1]  then communication should be perfect as well. In other words, it seems unlikely that there are barriers to communication. So, I should be able to communicate with the Apostles, upon my arrival for instance, but how? I personally only really know how to speak English fluently. My Spanish, Japanese, German, Russian, Chinese, and Latin is like that of a child, and my Greek is only in reading and writing.  If ...

A virtue is a trait of excellence. What is the highest virtue? It seems that based on the nature of truth, that truth itself is perhaps the highest virtue. For instance, I could say that love is the highest virtue, but then I could ask the question of whether that is true or not. If it is or isn’t true, this places truth virtuously higher than love, at least in some sense. The fact that I can question love through the lens of truth seems to place truth above love in height of virtue. On the other hand, if I said that truth is the highest virtue, then it seems that it would be loving to tell others the truth! Perhaps truth and love go hand in hand, but this also concerns the nature of what truth is.  Truth is a requirement for love, which I argue here , but is love a requirement for truth? Love must contain truth in order to be  true  love. But truth does not have to contain love in order to be true truth. Take for instance, mathematics, or numbers in general… Sometimes, t...

A couple years ago I wrote an article called  the Jehovah’s Witness training videos . The article was meant to be humorous in a sense, because there are likely not any actual training videos, but it seems that they have all watched them. We can suspect this because they all often have the same points of conversation. When you talk about the Trinity, they will use the Bible like a machine gun and shoot you with verses. The verses are always the same: Colossians 1:15, Mark 10:18… So, there is an implication that they all have the same information. There is one source from where they gather their patterns and behaviors. Similarly, I think we can see the power behind the system of the world as well. We can see what this power is like by the tracks he leaves behind. The contrast of the two systems is really seen in Revelation 14:8. “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who made all nations drink the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality.” John is using the word  Bab...

In the discussion of homosexuality, I always hear about how we should focus more on evangelizing those who identify as such and stop condemning the lifestyle and the person, etc. I feel like many Christians have stopped saying that homosexuality is wrong because they are more concerned with loving LGBTQ people but  love, by itself, is not the gospel .  Many people do not even know where to start in such a discussion, so this article seeks to get one started in a cordial discussion with one who identifies as LGBTQ.  Since people have such hardened hearts concerning such things, some direction in an often difficult conversation is beneficial.  I am also concerned with the idea that homosexuality and transgenderism is an acceptable, logical, and beneficial way to live. The reason I am more concerned with this at this time is because it seems that the reason homosexuality and transgenderism has exploded is because many Christians have stopped talking about it being sinfu...

In an article from July 30, 2013 (I know, it’s old…  https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/god-loves-the-sinner-but-hates-the-sin ), John Piper teaches that God hates certain people. The problem with this is that there are  inconsistencies  in the mind of the person (usually a Calvinist) who believes this, and even Piper in the article recognizes the inconsistency but tries to pass it off as a paradox. “He hates — now here is the paradox — and he loves at the same time.” [1]  The problem is that it is not a paradox, but simply a contradiction.   Let’s look at some different texts from where the belief that God hates certain persons likely came…    Psalm 5  Give ear to my words, O Lord;     consider my groaning. 2 Give attention to the sound of my cry,     my King and my God,     for to you do I pray. 3 O Lord, in the morning you hear my voice;     in the morning I pre...