Josiah Concept Ministries

Defending the Faith Against Its Detractors

Archive for November, 2007

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Atheist Morality

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 27, 2007

I was glancing at this post from the Diary of a Teenage Atheist.  The combox discussion had what amounts as an admission that nature is designed rather than evolved.

Matt Svoboda posed the following question to TA: “. . . ‘Where does the moral code come from?’ Why do our moral codes automatically tell us it is wrong for a person to kill another person in cold blood?”

Dave, who I assume is an atheist, answers the question this way:

Because humans are designed to be social creatures that thrive when arranged in communities. Those communities break down when murder in cold blood is allowed. Our “moral code” comes from our natural instinct to encourage behavior which leads to orderly societies. (emphasis added)

Dave is on the right track.  Remember Psalm 40:6 and Jeremiah 31:33?  The law of God, our moral code, is written within us by God.  We are, therefore, designed by God to be social creatures, and we thrive best within a society.

I really don’t see another answer to the question of morality’s source other than someone greater than ourselves who places it into our hearts.  He then becomes the standard by which we judge ourselves.  He cannot also be a part of creation; you can’t judge someone by his own standards, for that is not judging.  When you judge, you necessarily use someone else’s standard.

Dave said it himself.  Humans are “designed.”  Designed by whom?  I submit that we are designed by God.

Posted in Atheism, Morality | 4 Comments »

Infallibly Defined–On Two Lists out of Four

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 23, 2007

In my previous post, I examined the verses that appeared on all four of Steve Ray’s lists of infallibly defined verses according to the Roman Catholic Church. In this post, I will take a quick look at two verses which appear on two of the lists, Matthew 16:16-19 and Matthew 26:26-28 et. al. with 1 Corinthians 11:23-29.

Before I look at those verses, I thought that I would point out that the Catholic interpretations of these verses neglect the priesthood of all believers (1 Pet 2:4-5).

Matthew 16:16-19

The massive debate over this verse is centered around whether the “rock” is Peter, or his confession of Christ as the messiah.

The New Testament seems to assume that all believers are a holy priesthood (1 Pet 2:4-5).   Given that there is only one mediator between God and man (1 Tim 2:5), and all believers are baptized into one body (1 Cor 12:13), it is unlikely that the apostles were made special priests.  Instead, all believers were made ministers of a new covenant (2 Cor 3:6).

See a longer argument here.

Matthew 26:26-28, Mark 14:22-24, Luke 22:19-20, and 1 Corinthians 11:23-29

It isn’t much of a surprise that Jesus’ exact words were recored in the gospels, given that they are biographies of His life.  Paul repeats the key phrases “This is my body . . . This is my blood” in his first letter to the Corinthians.

But the larger context of 1 Corinthians 11 is rules and order for spiritual worship, not a theological treatise on the body and blood of Jesus Christ present in the Eucharist.  Therefore, it is unlikely that either Paul or any of the gospel writers were attempting to validate transubstantiation.

Moreover, interpreting these verses literally then asks us to interpret John 6:53-57 literally:

Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. . . .”

But reading that passage literally fails to take verse 63 in to account: “The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life” (emphasis added).

Defining the verses this way seems to be self-defeating.

Posted in Bible Thoughts, Papacy, Roman Catholicism, Transubstaniation | Leave a Comment »

Christmas Time is Here!

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 23, 2007

Traditionally speaking, I’ve always started decorating for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving. Obviously, that is a bit counter-culture these days. My short stint in retail has taught me that stores gear up for Christmas about two to three weeks before Halloween. The big stuff comes out after Thanksgiving, but more and more of the store is dominated by Christmas merchandise and decorations as Thanksgiving closes in. The radio begins to play some Christmas songs about a week before Thanksgiving, and then a few stations turn to all Christmas music through New Year’s Day.

From now until January 6, I will have this theme activated in celebration of Christmas. You will notice, also, the collections of links entitled “Winning the War on Christmas” in the column on the left. These are a few links that I’ve collected over the last month that highlight issues that atheists seem to have with Christ’s birth.  I will keep adding to it over the course of the holiday season as I see more apologetics Christmas.

Merry Christmas to all of my faithful readers!

Posted in Site News | Leave a Comment »

Infallibly Defined: Four Lists, Some Agreement **UPDATED**

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 21, 2007

It amazes me that the Catholic Church defines teachings infallibly, yet fails to leave a convenient list somewhere that tells us what has been infallibly taught. Steve Ray has posted four lists of infallibly defined Bible verses. One list contains 15 verses, while the other lists contain between 5 and 7 verses. This is still not the answer that we were looking for.

I decided to lay the verses out in a matrix and then tackle the verses that appear on all four lists. Amazingly, with fifteen verses to choose from, only five verses appear on all four lists. So I thought I’d take a peek at these five and see how the Catholic Church defines Bible verses.

Matthew 18:18 and John 20:23

These verses speak of the sacrament of penance in Catholic thought. The lists are unanimous in that interpretation. The sacrament of penance confers upon priests the power to forgive sins. Amazingly, only God had been able to forgive sins up to that point. Now, He has delegated this authority to Roman Catholic priests.

But who is a priest? Well, in the mind of the first Pope, all believers were priests. That drastically changes the reading of those verses. So does the context of the verses themselves: Jesus isn’t speaking directly to the apostles, He is speaking to a crowd that had gathered. Jesus follows this up with a parable that indicates if we withhold forgiveness from anyone, God will withhold forgiveness from us. This means that we are all called to forgive others of their sins, as our heavenly Father forgives us (cf. Mt 18:35). Turns out, God hasn’t delegated His power; the Roman Catholic Church would like you to think that He has. I have a longer argument on this verse here.

Luke 22:19 and 1 Corinthians 11:24

The larger context of these verses should dictate their meaning, not some imagined implication of transubstantiation.  Obviously, as a biography of Jesus, the Gospel of Luke would contain His words.  No big surprise here.

The passage in 1 Corinthians isn’t a theological treatise on Christ’s words; rather, it is part of a set of rules for how church services are conducted and the proper etiquette at each phase of the service.

Taken together, these two verses cannot form the basis for the doctrine of transubstantiation. That isn’t to say that Christ isn’t promising His presence in the Eucharist.  All I’m saying is that that concept is not defined within Scripture at these points.

John 3:5

Jesus commanded baptism not just here, but also in the Great Commission:

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. (Mt 28:18-20, emphasis added)

I have no doubt that baptism is necessary. However, like any “work,” salvation isn’t contingent upon it. Think of it this way: if I desire to follow Jesus and all of His teachings, would I refuse baptism? The Lord clearly commanded it, and great things happen in the Bible to people who are baptized. The Lord wants us to be baptized. The apostle Paul comments:

We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. (Rom 6:4-5)

Why, if we desire to follow Him, would we not be baptized? This is a no-brainer. Of course we’ll get baptized. But out of a desire to serve the Lord as He commands, not out of necessity. Same reason that we do any work of law. As I’ve become so fond of saying in posts lately, “For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Cor 3:6) Find a longer argument on the necessity for baptism here.

Romans 5:12

I have no problem with the definition of this verse pertaining to a sinful nature. Adam, through his original sin, imputed a sinful and fallen nature to all men. Christ, through His perfect life, imputes righteousness to all men who call on Him (Joel 2:32; Hab 2:4).

Jms 5:14

I have no problem with the elders praying over the sick and anointing with holy oils. The problem I do have is that the NAB translates the word “elder” in this verse as “presbyter,” clearly an attempt to add the presbyter class into the Bible.

In a future post, I will detail the verses found on two lists. There are two of them, Matthew 16:16-19 and Matthew 26:26-38 (and its counterpart within the other gospels) with 1 Corinthians 11:23-29.

Posted in Roman Catholicism | 1 Comment »

FSM used by God?

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 20, 2007

Sometimes, I do work that doesn’t require a lot of mental engagement.  While I’m doing that, I come up with some weird thoughts and those can occasionally turn into blog entries.  This is one of those times.

Let me back up to when I was a manager at Wendy’s.  I had purchased a lot of books that showed how to build a team by tactics mined from Scripture.  These included The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership by John C. Maxwell and Teach Your Team to Fish by Laurie Beth Jones.  I used a lot of the tactics I learned, but one thing I never did was give Christ the credit.  Neither in prayer nor to the people I managed.

I think that that was a very bad move.  Scripture says that “whoever denies me [Jesus] before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven” (Mt 10:33).  I was a coward; I thought it was more important to not offend people by bringing religion into the issue than to give any credit to where the techniques I was using came from.

And so I met with little success.

Now, I’m using the same techniques at Burger King, but I’m acknowledging their source–God–proud and loud.  Not surprisingly, I’m meeting with much more success.

My point is the Scripture I quoted above: “whoever denies me [Jesus] before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven” (Mt 10:33).

As I understand Intelligent Design, it is merely a scientific expression of the creation account of Genesis without naming the entity that created.  It acknowledges a supernatural creator without defining that creator.  Sounds an awful lot like what I did with the leadership techniques.  I acknowledged that I got them from the Bible, but did not acknowledge God.

Intelligent design does the same thing: acknowledges a creator without acknowledging God.  “[W]hoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven” (Mt 10:33).

The problem is that God is inextricably tied to His creation.  To know His creation is to know Him: “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse” (Rom 1:20, emphasis added).

The Flying Spaghetti Monster has been used by atheists to shoot down intelligent design.  Or has it?  Perhaps the Noodly Master has been used by God to shoot down intelligent design because God doesn’t appreciate being taken out of the equation by otherwise well-meaning scientists.

Let’s be honest: Is intelligent design really how we want to preach God?  Do we really want to leave the possibility of other creator deities open for discussion?  It doesn’t seem as though that is how God would want it.  Did He not say to Moses:

You shall have no other gods before me. . . .  You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. (Ex 20:3, 5-6)

Why on earth would we think that intelligent design is God-honoring?  Leaving open the possibility of other deities invites people to worship and serve them.  But what is the Great Commission?  Is it to get people to think that the universe has a creator, and it might be the Christian God, and you can serve Him if you think that He is the creator?

No!  It is to “Go . . . and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Mt 28:19-20, emphasis added).  Note that Jesus doesn’t talk about possibilities; He gives concrete commands.  He tells us in no uncertain terms that we are baptizing these people in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit: the triune Christian God, the creator of the universe.  There are no maybe’s with Jesus.

There should be no maybe’s with us either.  We should be able to stand up and say what Paul said to the Ephesian elders: “Therefore(A) I testify to you this day that(B) I am innocent of the blood of all of you, 27for(C) I did not shrink from declaring to you(D) the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:26-27).  We, too, should not shy away from preaching the whole counsel of God.  Like Paul, we should not be ashamed of the gospel (cf. Rom 1:16; 2 Tim 1:8-12).

Look at Ken Hamm compared to ID proponents.  I’m not saying that I agree with a 6,000 year old earth and dinosaurs living side-by-side with humans.  I’m starting to lean back toward a more scientific view, which includes evolution.  But, I admire people like Dr. Hamm much more than I admire ID proponents because Ken Hamm is preaching the whole counsel of God!  He isn’t afraid of the gospel.

ID proponents should spend more effort to put God’s name into their work.  Maybe it would become more recognized.  Maybe even accepted in scientific circles.  It doesn’t sound likely, but neither is Christianity.  Putting God’s name back into the tips and tricks I learned certainly worked for me, and I believe that it can work for ID.

Posted in Apologetics, Creationism, Father, Jesus, Science | 2 Comments »

The Atheist Continues Reading, part III

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 19, 2007

Second, is the god depicted in the Old Testament books I have read so far (Genesis through Numbers) the same god that I will encounter in the New Testament, or are these two different gods? If it is the same god, then it would seem that reading the Old Testament is worthwhile because it will teach me quite a bit about the character of this god, even if the covenants change. On the other hand, if we have two different gods here, then I should probably stop reading the Old Testament, as it is really telling me nothing useful. (source)

Yes, the God from the Old Testament is the same God of the New Testament.

You hit the nail on the head.  The covenants change, which is why the seeming change in character.  I assure you, however, the Father is every bit as wrathful as you see in the Old Testament (cf. Rom 9:22-24; 1 Cor 11:32b; Rev 3:19).  It is the Holy Spirit that shows the nurturing side of God’s character, and the Son who bore the Father’s wrath so that we, the elect, don’t have to.  For a good outline of the Father’s continuing wrath, see this recent post.

Because God is a Trinity–three Persons of one essence–anything spoken of one can also be spoken of the others.  So Jesus Christ–God–is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb 13:8), and so is the Father.  His character has not changed, His wrath is merely sated in a different fashion.

By all means, read the Old Testament.  It will give you insight into God’s character.  He does punish, He does destroy.  He is vengeful and full of wrath when His children sin.  He smites the disobedient.  But He is more complex than righteous anger.  He loves the world so much, that He offered us the means of salvation (Jn 3:16) if we only confess faith in Christ (Rom 10:9-10).  A single confession that will change your life forever for the better.

Posted in Apologetics, Atheism, Bible Thoughts, Theology, Trinity | Leave a Comment »

Atheist Misunderstands the Bible. . . AGAIN!

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 17, 2007

VJack from the Atheist Revolution has really been catching my eye with his recent posts. I’m still in the middle of critiquing his view of the Bible’s early books. I have to answer one more question that he has proposed, which I will get to probably early next week. I’m going to be working quite a bit, and I still have a lot of reading to do for both this site and my new site.

On to VJack: his most recent post on Christianity and Dehumanization can be summed up in the following paragraph from it:

When those who embrace Jesus are perceived as being better people than those who do not, we have an entryway to dehumanization. The Christian bible teaches that god has a chosen people who are favored above all others. This jealous god routinely kills those who disobey his commands and leads his followers in the destruction of multiple outgroups. When god is on one’s side, one can do now wrong and one is has a certain moral superiority over all others. The bible teaches Christians that non-Christians are evil, admonishing them to kill nonbelievers and persons who worship other gods.

If I actually bought into VJack’s statement, “When god is on one’s side, one can do now [sic] wrong and one is has a certain moral superiority over all others,” then I would agree with the rest of his point.  Yes, the Jews were the chosen people of God, but they did plenty of things wrong during the course of being His chosen ones.  All of that is recorded throughout the books of Numbers, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, and the Prophets.  God never protects us absolutely from doing anything wrong; it is still our free will to sin.

Next, I don’t believe that the Bible teaches anywhere that Christians are morally superior to anyone.  It exhorts us to remain blameless–which indicates that we are not, in fact, blameless, since we must be exhorted to remain so.  Romans 3:23 succinctly states that “. . . all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  All.  As in everyone: “Everyone has turned away. Together they have become rotten to the core. No one, not even one person, does good things” (Ps 14:3).

What does Paul say of Christians and sin?  After building a case for total depravity more harsh than the one I just stated above (see Rom 1:18-32), he goes on to say this: “Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things” (Rom 2:1, emphasis added).

The bumper sticker says “Christians aren’t better.  We’re just forgiven.”  How true those words are!

Next, I don’t believe that Christianity dehumanizes anyone.  The Bible teaches that we are all made in the image of God (Gen 1:27).  Also relevant is the story of Peter’s vision in Acts 10.

VJack’s final assertion, “The bible teaches Christians that non-Christians are evil, admonishing them to kill nonbelievers and persons who worship other gods” interested me since the Bible actually commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves, which is part of the Greatest Commandment.  And the Great Commission admonishes us to baptize every nation in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  I’d argue that it is impossible to do those things if we are killing the people we are supposed to love and baptize.

The apostle Paul writes:

Don’t pay people back with evil for the evil they do to you. Focus your thoughts on those things that are considered noble.  As much as it is possible, live in peace with everyone. Don’t take revenge, dear friends. Instead, let God’s anger take care of it. After all, Scripture says, “I alone have the right to take revenge. I will pay back, says the Lord.” But, “If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink. If you do this, you will make him feel guilty and ashamed.” Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil with good.  (Rom 12:17-21)

I checked VJack’s proof text for Christians commanded to kill non-Christians, and it happens to be this:

In one of the cities the LORD your God is giving you, there may be a man or woman among you who is doing what the LORD considers evil. This person may be disregarding the conditions of the LORD’S promise by worshiping and bowing down to other gods, the sun, the moon, or the whole army of heaven. I have forbidden this. When you are told about it, investigate it thoroughly. If it’s true and it can be proven that this disgusting thing has been done in Israel, then bring the man or woman who did this evil thing to the gates of your city, and stone that person to death.  (Deut 17:2-5)

Deuteronomy is a lousy book to use for a proof text of anything.  In context, this book is a suzerainty treaty between God and the nation of Israel, a nation that has since been destroyed.  This means that the terms of the contract–especially the enforcement clauses–are no longer binding on anyone.  Paul says of the law of Moses, “. . . the letter kills, but the Spirit brings life” (2 Cor 3:6).  Since the law is no longer binding on us, we should look at why that rule was given and follow the reasoning behind it rather than rely on the actual words of the law.

The Bible is our written source book; by which we can objectively check how God reacts to certain actions or behaviors.  The penalties ascribed show that what we think of as minor sins, God actually views as a very big deal.  The law is really written in our hearts (cf. Ps 40:8 and Jer 31:33).  We need Christ, not the law (cf. Gal 3:24-26).

But I want everyone to notice something: VJack is wrong about the interpretation of this verse.  Note that it says “there may be a man or woman among you,” that is, a Jew!  This verse is only speaking of Jews, not the Gentiles.  VJack is seriously misrepresenting what the Bible says regarding in this matter.  I’ll close with the words of Christ:

You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,  so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. (Mat 5:43-45)

Posted in Apologetics, Atheism, Bible Thoughts, Morality | 4 Comments »

FSM Getting More Credit Than He Deserves ** UPDATED**

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 16, 2007

Religious scholars are meeting this weekend to discuss the pseudo-deity known as the Flying Spaghetti Monster. According to Wikipedia, FSM was created in 2005 by physics major Bobby Henderson in order to protest the teaching of intelligent design in Kansas classrooms. Since its wide media exposure, the FSM is used by atheists and agnostics alike to discredit the existence of God.

The American Academy of Religion has a few talks on its plate (no pun intended) about the Noodly Master. The graduate students giving the talks, Samuel Snyder, Alyssa Beall, and Gavin Van Horn, insist that this carbohydrate creator raises serious questions about the origin and practice of religion.

In other words, are religions based on theology or on practices? Most atheists would argue that religion is only a method to control behavior. They point to made-up religions like pastafarianism as a way to make this point. Richard Dawkins refers to it in The God Delusion, and frequently in debates.

So what are the grad students’ conclusions? I guess we’ll have to wait for the papers to be published. I just think that this lends far too much credence to a phenomenon that already has too much attention.

Dr. William Lane Craig agrees with that:

I think you can see that the Flying Spaghetti Monster is vastly overrated, both as a parody and as a being. As a parody, he fails to show that an inference to an intelligent designer of the universe is either illegitimate or unwarranted. What the parody shows is that we are not justified in attributing to our explanatory postulates arbitrary properties that are not justified by the evidence. Natural theologians have always known this. That’s why, for example, Thomas Aquinas, after his five brief paragraphs in his Summa theologiae proving the existence of a being “to which everyone gives the name ‘God’,” goes on to discuss in the next nine questions God’s simplicity, perfection, goodness, limitlessness, omnipresence, immutability, eternity, and unity.

As a being, the Flying Spaghetti Monster comes up drastically deficient as an explanation of those phenomena, some of which you list, which lie at the basis of the arguments for God’s existence. Those arguments, if all sound, as I think they are, require cumulatively a being which is the metaphysically necessary, self-existent, beginningless, uncaused, timeless, spaceless, immaterial, personal, omnipotent, omniscient Creator and Designer of the universe, who is perfectly good, whose nature is the standard of goodness, and whose commands constitute our moral duties.

The real lesson to be learned from the case of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is that it shows how completely out of touch our popular culture is with the great tradition of natural theology.  (source)

Posted in Atheism, Humor, Theology | 2 Comments »

The Atheist Continues Reading, part II

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 15, 2007

First, please help me locate the part of the New Testament that will make it clear to me that Leviticus, Numbers, and whatever other books to which this claim applies were invalidated by Jesus. I’m not saying you are wrong – I’m nowhere close to even starting the New Testament yet – I’d just like to know where I’ll find this part so I can be more careful about how I’m reading the Old Testament now. (source)

The Old Testament law is essentially divided into two basic categories.  Jewish Ceremonial Laws (which includes dietary laws) and General Moral Principles.  I would think that reading the law books, this division would be obvious to a reasonable person such as VJack.  In Romans and Galatians, Paul makes the purpose of the law clear: to teach us what sin is (Rom 3:19-31; Gal 3:10-14).  We are enslaved to sin (Eph 2:1-3).  But thanks to the grace of God that we enjoy through Christ, sin no longer has any dominion over us because Christ’s sacrifice freed us from the law (Rom 6:14).

Why do we still have the Bible?  My brother-in-law shared this in an e-mail to me, and I think it perfectly expresses what I’m trying to say:

It [the Bible] was written long ago, but it very much is valid in modern times. It is a timeless book of truths that is 100% correct. It should be our source for faith and understanding, but not the ONLY source. That is what prayer and thinking of Christ does for us. We are able to look past what the scripture says to the WHY. But without the initial scripture, we could never have anything to hold it accountable to. The Bible is the final authority. Period.

And if we are free of the letter of the law as my brother-in-law says (and Paul says in 2 Cor 3:6), then why not just live a life of sin?  We’re saved anyway, right?  We can find ways to argue that our sin is the “spirit” of the law, can’t we?  Well, the apostle Paul said it better than I could in Romans 6:1-14.  If we profess a life of righteousness by faith, we ought to live that life out rather than just talk about or think about.

Posted in Apologetics, Atheism, Bible Thoughts, Jesus, Morality, Theology | 1 Comment »

The Atheist Continues Reading

Posted by Cory Tucholski on November 15, 2007

I may have misjudged VJack from Atheist Revolution. I thought that his true motive behind reading the Bible from cover to cover was to poke fun at it. But it seems that the convicting power of the Holy Spirit may be at work in his heart, as he now seems to actually want to understand what he is reading with more clarity:

When confronted with scriptural evidence that there are many laws, clearly stated as such, for which the penalties are often banishment or death, which virtually no modern Christian even attempts to follow, one should expect a predictable Christian response. The wording will vary, but the response will be along the lines of how the Old Testament no longer applies because god’s covenant with Moses and his predecessors was replaced by Jesus and the New Testament.

Fair enough. I’ll ask two things of the Christian making this claim, and I’ll ask them not in a challenging manner but as a plea for assistance. (source)

I’ll answer his questions in a moment. But first, let’s understand why there are no more animal sacrifices.

First off, we have to understand that the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23a). Calling death a “wage” implies that we earn it through our sins. All have sinned (Rom 3:23), so all have earned death by their sin. This means that every human being on this planet deserves to die because we all sin. Everyone.

With that in mind, is it so terrible that God demands the death penalty for some sins that we consider relatively minor? Of course not–it is all sin, which is paid for by death. “[W]ithout the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins” (Heb 9:22)–either our own blood or someone else’s. Up to this point, the blood of animals had been used to cleanse and purify us from our sins (Heb 9:13). Now, the precious blood of Christ purifies us (Heb 9:14).

Christ offered Himself to the Father, perfect and without blemish (Heb 9:14), as propitiation for our sins once for all (Heb 9:26b). Throughout the book of Hebrews, the author argues that the tabernacle and Tent of Meeting described in the Book of the Law is an imperfect copy of heaven (Heb 9:1-12). Jesus has entered into the real thing–heaven–and is seated at the right hand of the Father, making intersession for us in a way that no high priest ever could (Heb 1:3b, Heb 7:11-28).

The prophets predict an end to animal sacrifices. Malachi predicts that a new type of sacrifice will be offered:

For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the LORD of hosts. (1:11)

This is fulfilled by Christians living by the word of God, everyday and in every place:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. (Rom 12:1-2)

Christ’s sacrifice perfects us. We no longer need animal blood to do so.

I will address VJack’s specific questions in my next post. Stay tuned.

Posted in Apologetics, Atheism, Bible Thoughts, Father, Holy Spirit, Jesus, Theology | Leave a Comment »

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