Questions for Christians
I have a genuine interest in trying to understand and would be very grateful to any Christians who might be able to help. I have a few questions in particular to which I’ve never heard a satisfactory answer. Feel free to answer any or all and thankyou very much for any comments you do decide to leave 
1. Are your beliefs based on faith or evidence?
2. Is the Bible meant to be taken literally? And if only parts of it are, how do you know what is literal and what isn’t?
3: What’s to be learned from the following Bible quote:
Judges 19: 22-27
22 While they were enjoying themselves, some of the wicked men of the city surrounded the house. Pounding on the door, they shouted to the old man who owned the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we may know him.”
23 The owner of the house went outside and said to them, “No, my friends, don’t be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don’t do this disgraceful thing. 24 Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But to this man, don’t do such a disgraceful thing.”
25 But the men would not listen to him. So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go. 26 At daybreak the woman went back to the house where her master was staying, fell down at the door and lay there until daylight.
27 When her master got up in the morning and opened the door of the house and stepped out to continue on his way, there lay his concubine, fallen in the doorway of the house, with her hands on the threshold. 28 He said to her, “Get up; let’s go.” But there was no answer. Then the man put her on his donkey and set out for home.”
4. (Assuming you take it all literally, and picking just one example) How did Noah get polar bears, kangaroos, etc onto the Ark?
5. Leviticus 25:44” ‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves.” Does this mean slavery is ok?
6. Why are the events of the Bible all situated in one small area of the Globe?
7. Matthew 13: 55-57 “55Is not this the carpenter’s son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? 56And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things?” Did Jesus have brothers and sisters, and if so, were they all virgin births too?
8. How do you know the Bible isn’t man-made?
9. Is God omnipotent or omnipresent?
10. (One for Muslim readers) When a female suicide bomber gets to heaven does she get 81 male virgins as a reward?
Interesting questions. I heard a speaker on the radio today (Chip Ingram), addressing the question “why I believe”… you can listen to his podcasts at http://www.lote.org/listen.html and find the daily broadcast page. I just checked, and there are some really interesting looking titles that I’m going to go listen to now. I hope you find your answers! You picked some really hard questions.
If you truly do have a “genuine interest” I will be glad to answer your questions point-by-point.
1. Yes. Beliefs based on nothing is what is called blind faith. God and the Bible do not call for blind faith, but faith based on evidence. You exercise faith on a daily basis based upon the evidence of past experience. When you drive down a road you have not been on before that appears to be a good, well maintained road, and you come to a bridge, you do not stop the car and get out and inspect the bridge. (Though you might be more likely to after recent bridge collapses.) But instead you, in faith, drive accross the bridge. That faith, however, is based upon your past experience with driving over bridges, etc. It is the same with God and the Bible. They have proved themselves to me in many ways in the past and the various evidences of the veracity of the Bible strengthen that faith, even when there may be things I do not fully understand or have not yet seen. (Heaven for example.) God says, “Come let us reason together.”
If you truly have a “genuine interest” you would probably like to see the evidences that I am talking about. If that is the case, let me know and we can go over a number of evidences together.
2. The Bible is to be taken literally, unless it is clear from the text itself that it should be taken symbolically. This means that creation, flood, miracles, stories, etc. are literal, but when it comes to things like visions of beasts with four heads and four wings those are symbolic and the Bible itself gives the meaning of the symbols. Many times the meaning of the symbols is given in the same book, though there are many that are explained elsewhere as well.
3. First, the depravity of sin and what it does to mankind. Second if you continue reading, it leads to some other horrible events that were an unfortunate, but important part of the history of Israel. Mostly, it portrays what happens when “every man did that which was right in his own eyes” instead of following God’s laws or civil laws or both.
4. He didn’t. God brought onto the ark the original “kinds” of animals. He did not have to bring all of the different kinds of dogs or cats or birds or whatever, only the original kinds that had all of the genetic potential for the variation we see today. Also, He did not have to bring adults, but could have brought young.
5. The Bible never condones slavery. It did not condemn “slavery” per se, but it did give guidelines on how to treat slaves. Essentially, the guidelines that the Bible gives for those who chose to have slaves would have meant that the slaves were more like live-in maids and ranch hands, not the horrific dehumanizing slavery that we typically think of.
6. The are not. The majority of it is, but not all. The focus is always on God’s people that He chose for the purpose of sharing the truths of the gospel with the world. In Old Testament times that was in the middle east. In New Testament times that was transitioning to Europe and towards the end of the prophecies you also have the United States involved. (I will gladly explain from start to finish on prophecy, but it would take some time.)
7. Yes Jesus had brothers and sister, though, they were not all “blood relatives.” His “brothers” were “the sons of Joseph” and thus not directly related by blood. Jesus is “the only begotten of the Father”. Mary did not stay a virgin, she was married to Joseph and sex between a husband and a wife is not sin. God even commanded Adam and Eve before sin to “be fruitful and multiply.”
8. I can give you a lot on this, but this post is already way too long. Contact me. (See above)
9. Yes. He created time and space and thus exists outside of time and space, in essence experiencing everything and everywhere at once. He is omnipotent, the source of all matter and energy.
10. I am not a Muslim, but I don’t believe there is any such promise for them in the Q’uran.
Sorry, I had put contact info in and taken back out. I should have reviewed it again before posting. Here is my contact info randylhess NOspam at yahoo. You know what to do with the NO spam part.
I hope that you continue seeking after truth.
I’m not a believer in any of the Gods but I do find it interesting to hear what other people believe in so thankyou Heidi and Randy for sharing.
Starfish, I glean from your artwork as well as comments that you’re trying to bate Christians into an intellectual discussion about Christianity and it seems that you’ve succeeded. However, God’s truth, the understanding of His Word doesn’t come through intellectual debate. I can tell you that from my own experience. You won’t become convinced that you need forgiveness of your sins through someone trying to convince you of the fact, however true this may be, Only God’s Spirit can convict of sin, though he may use a Believer in the process. No one is going to explain the meaning of the Bible to you because The Bible is God’s love letter to His children and , Starfish, you’ve been reading someone elses mail. If you’ll acknowledge your sin to God and ask for forgiveness, accepting Jesus sacrifice on The Cross to pay for your forgiveness God will give you all the understanding you’ll need. If you’re trying to discredit “Religion” that’s easy. Religion is man’s attempt to please and appease God. It’s mans intellect trying to define God according to his understanding. God has promised to deal with “Religion”.Christianity is NOT a religion. It’s God reaching out to people to establish a relationship with Him through His Son, my Lord, Jesus Christ. You may laugh and scoff and feel intellectually superior but the time will come ,Starfish when ……. but I don’t need to describe it. You’ll know.
Thanks for the comment Mizpah. I’m sorry if you think I’m trying to discredit religion, scoff or feel superior by asking questions. My intention in posing them was to find out how religious people rationalise some of the more seemingly awkward areas of the Bible and faith. Prior to Randy’s comment I couldn’t begin to imagine how the Bible could be thought of as the sole moral code to follow with it’s references to rape, slavery and human sacrifice. I now see how even these (at face value) conflicting things can be fitted into a person’s view of the World.
Anyway, I hope your faith in your God works for you, and lets both hope that the God(s) of Islam, the Greeks or the Vikings don’t turn out to be correct or…(I don’t need to describe it, we’ll both know!)
Well Lucy, I’m sorry if I misunderstood your motives . The problem is though that you’re trying to approach a subject that can only be understood spiritually with an intellectual approach. Spiritual understanding can only result from a Spiritual relationship with God and that’s only possible if you’ll surrender yourself to God and ask Him to forgive your sin and accept Jesus as your Savior and Lord, I’m afraid that you misunderstood my comment about discrediting religion. Please reread my comments about religion and Christianity. They are 2 different things. Religion is from men. Christianity is from God, Religion is intellectual. Christianity is spiritual.
Religion will be destroyed. Christianity will last for eternity. I admire your desire to learn. I suggest that you seek the truth you say you’re looking for from God in the way I’ve stated above and not from the opinions of men. If God doesn’t meet your expectations you can always go back to asking people on the blog what they think.
Okay, I’m sorry mipah3, but I’m going to have to disagree with you pretty much completely. I am a Christian and a philosophy major, and your claim that Christianity cannot be defended via reason is -I apologize- a cop-out, as they say.
Lucy, you pose excellent questions, and I think I will dedicate a blog entry to them in a few days. Nice entry though.
It is easy to see how this type of rationalization leads individuals of different faiths to believe their way is the right way and therefore grants them backstage passes to God that other faiths do not, making them God’s chosen people.
Thankfully, there are religious individuals amongst these extremists, who believe not one specific denomination of the Abrahamic Religions necessarily bears a truth monopoly over the rest. It is precisely through that type of open-mindedness and tolerance, that they live up to the ideals of their faith better than their intolerant, absolutist, religious counterparts.
On the issue of spirituality and non-religiosity, Buddhism is a strong contender.
Hey Lucy, one can never be too sure, but you seem honestly interested in a discussion regarding the rationality of various “awkward” Bible verses. I’d love to invite you to a comment discussion on my blog about this; would you be up for it if I started out a post?
[...] respected those who had a faith, and just wanted to know their thoughts. She had one post called Questions for Christians. I sort of felt led to try to answer those questions. I sent her an e-mail response to her [...]
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