Category Archives: Apologetics

The virtue of faith

08 Wednesday Jul 2015

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The word “faith” is used in many ways today. It is important to understand correctly what faith is, because the Bible is very clear that faith is a requirement for salvation (Eph 2:8; Heb 11:6). The faith which is necessary for salvation is, specifically, faith in God, in His Son, and in the Christian gospel. But the New Testament also uses the term “faith” in a broader sense, such as when Jesus admonished Peter for having little faith (Matt 14:31). Faith has two components: belief (intellectual) and trust (volitional). Faith is never a leap in the dark. It is rational trust.

It is common for people today to speak of misguided or false faith—that is, a belief/trust in the wrong thing. But the Bible presents faith as a virtue. Faith is listed among the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. Faith is listed among the gifts of the Spirit in 1 Corinthians 12:9 (cf. 1 Cor 13:2). Faith is everywhere spoken of positively in the New Testament.

The classical virtues are often defined as a mean between two extremes, and faith may be defined as a mean between gullibility and skepticism. Faith, like love and joy, is always a virtue if exercised according to the proper sense of the term. There is therefore no such thing as misguided or false faith, properly speaking. One may have misplaced trust or false beliefs, but the English word “faith” traditionally was used solely to describe a virtue. Faith is always right, if it is true faith (cf. 2 Thess 3:2). Today, non-Christian religions are commonly called other “faiths,” but properly speaking they are other religions or cults. Their truth-claims are lies, and their followers are gullible, deceived, and depraved. They have no claim to the virtue of faith.

How does one avoid both gullibility and skepticism, and only place his faith in what is true and right? How does one know whether to be trusting or skeptical? The answer has to do with character and holiness. Every truth-claim that one is presented with is made by some person or group of people. If the person is honest, moral, upright, and holy in every respect, we ought to be inclined to believe the claims he makes. However, if the person has some character flaw, we ought to be skeptical or disbelieving, no matter how convincing he may sound. In the end, there is only One whom we may trust absolutely, and that is the One who is absolutely holy—namely, the triune God. What God says is to be believed without question, because it is impossible for God to lie or deceive or to be mistaken (Num 23:19; Tit 1:2; Heb 6:18). The Bible presents a moral standard that is higher, holier, truer, more pure, and more just than any human standard ever devised. The character of God’s people is qualitatively different than the character of unbelievers. This shows that the Bible is God’s Word, and that God is absolutely holy and trustworthy. What godly men say, we are to be inclined to believe, though we must compare what they say to what God has said as the ultimate standard. This is an important principle, which therefore bears repeating: faith is to be exercised in proportion to the character of the one making the claim, with all claims to be measured against the claims made by the triune God, who is the only perfectly trustworthy One. So how do you know whether to believe someone? You know on the basis of his character.

An illustration: in a court of law, if two witnesses tell different stories, the court examines the character of the witnesses. If one witness has a bad reputation and poor character, and the other witness has a good reputation and high character, the witness with the better character is trusted. When it comes to spiritual matters, the contrast could not be any clearer. God is holy, and the fruit of the Spirit is entirely good. Satan is evil, and he and his followers are entirely bad. So when Satan contradicts what God says, what should you do? Should you say, “Well, that sounds plausible—now I’m confused”? No way! Believe the Witness whose character is perfect, for He can be trusted to tell the truth.

In my next post, I will look more specifically at the rationality of faith–that is, the relationship between faith and reason.

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The Sign of Jonah

04 Saturday Apr 2015

Posted by in Apologetics, Easter

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What does the historicity of the Old Testament book of Jonah have to do with Easter? Quite a bit, actually. In Matthew 12:39-41, Jesus said, An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet: for as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the fish; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall stand up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, a greater than Jonah is here.

Jonah was a sign to the people of Nineveh in that he came back from the dead in a sense—not literally, but after having spent three days under the ocean, in the stomach of a fish. In the context of this quotation from Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is arguing that His resurrection would prove the unbelief of the Pharisees. The people of Nineveh repented at the sign of Jonah, but the Pharisees would not repent at the greater sign of the Son of man’s resurrection from the dead. But if there never was a Jonah who spent three days and three nights in the belly of a fish, and if he never did preach in Nineveh and lead the city to repentance, the comparison would be imaginary and would prove nothing about the Pharisees. And if Jonah wasn’t literally in the belly of a fish for three days, then maybe Jesus wasn’t literally in the grave for three days, either. Jesus’ assertion that “a greater One than Jonah is here” would also be an empty claim if Jonah never actually preached at Nineveh.

There are, however, strong reasons to believe in the historicity of both the prophet Jonah and the events in the biblical book which bears his name. The strongest reason is, of course, the fact that the book of Jonah is a part of inspired Scripture, as acknowledged by both the ancient Jews and the Lord Jesus Christ. The man Jonah is mentioned in another part of the Old Testament, in 2 Kings 14:25. The historical context in which Jonah is mentioned in 2 Kings 14:25 corresponds to a period of weakness and disorder in the Neo-Assyrian Empire, during which Jonah’s warning that Nineveh would be overthrown in forty days would have been particularly believable. During this period, there was a time in which the administrative control of the Assyrian king was reduced to “greater Nineveh,” which explains why Nineveh is the main focus of Jonah’s prophecies (rather than “Assyria”). There are good reasons to believe that when Nineveh is described as a journey of three days in breadth (Jonah 3:3), with 120,000 young children (Jonah 4:11), it is the district of Nineveh that is referenced, and not just that part of Nineveh enclosed by the city wall.

Many critics have also asserted that it is impossible for a man to survive for three days and three nights in the belly of a fish. While this fish is said to have been specially prepared by God (Jonah 1:17), it still was a real fish, and it really did swallow Jonah alive. The common idea that this fish was a whale is nowhere stated in Scripture; in fact, whales are very rare in the Mediterranean, and this was more likely a great white shark, which has a much slower metabolism than a whale. It is also important to realize that the term “three days and three nights” does not necessarily refer to a full 72-hour period, but only to parts of three days. “Day and night” is a Hebrew idiom for what we would call a “day.” Among other references to “day and night” in the Bible, Jesus said that His body would be buried for three days and three nights (Matt 12:40), yet He was buried late in the day on Friday and raised at early dawn on Sunday, a period of about 36 hours.

For more detailed argumentation regarding the historicity of the book of Jonah, see my new Kindle book, The Historicity of the Book of Jonah, and Why It Still Matters.

What does the Bible teach about hell and eternal punishment?

30 Thursday Oct 2014

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I have published a short $2.99 Kindle ebook entitled The Bible’s Teaching on Endless Punishment, and Objections to It—just in time for Halloween. (No, you don’t need to own a Kindle device to read it—there are free Kindle readers for computers, tablets, and phones.) A few thoughts excerpted from the book:

  • The Bible describes three compartments in the underworld: Hades, the abyss, and the lake of fire. Most modern writers use the term “hell” when referring to any or all compartments of the underworld.
  • People who say that a loving God would not send people to hell generally also struggle to explain the existence of evil and suffering in the world in which we live. How can a loving God permit so much pain and wickedness in the world? This is a real problem for people who deny a literal hell because if justice is not served in this life then it is not served at all, and it obviously is not served in this life. God’s tolerance of evil in the world can only be explained if it is recognized that every sin will someday receive the punishment that it deserves.
  • People would not get upset about the Bible’s teaching on hell and eternal torment if there were no such thing in reality. If hell really were a ridiculous, fairy-tale concept, unbelievers would not care if some people accept the idea. The reason it bothers them is because they have an inner sense that it is real (Heb 2:15; 10:27).
  • Pastors who believe in annihilationism or universalism lose the ability to preach with authority. They can only make recommendations regarding what people should be doing, but can never say they must do it, and cannot prove that the way we live life has any eternal significance. One formerly universalist pastor says, “My religion was reduced to a self-help methodology, a happy way to cope with life. I became a moralist, a counselor, a two-bit pop psychologist” (David Hanson, The Art of Pastoring [Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1994], 85).
  • Objection: The New Testament reveals the love of God in Christ in a way that is incompatible with a doctrine of hell and eternal punishment. This is the official position of the Church of England. The problem with it is, the New Testament contains many more references to hell and eternal punishment than the Old Testament (234 out of the 260 chapters in the New Testament say something about judgment), and the majority of these New Testament references are statements made by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Those who say that Jesus is too loving to send anybody to hell are selectively choosing to accept only those sayings of Jesus that they like, while rejecting or ignoring the ones they find offensive. The New Testament actually gives a much clearer and fuller revelation of the doctrine of hell and eternal punishment than the Old Testament, and it does so primarily through Jesus’ direct teaching. Also, the message of the gospel is that Jesus had to die for the sins of the world because sin demands punishment, and the only punishment that will satisfy the demands of justice is death. The cross is robbed of its purpose and significance if there is no such thing as a second death. If God does not give those who reject Christ’s atonement the same penalty for sin as was applied to His Son, then there never was any real need for a sacrificial death to atone for sin, and there is a real question as to the fairness of the cross itself.

This is objection #1 that I present in the book, but I believe the real objection is #7: The lake of fire is horrible and disturbing beyond comprehension, and I cannot accept a doctrine that is so appalling and awful. An even deeper objection lies behind this one—I like to sin, and I want to believe that I can get away with it. You can read my answer to these objections and more in the book.