Roger, thanks for your response. I suppose that if one really wanted to delve into the debate regarding each religion's authoritative texts one would have to really study each one. I know that my argumentation is based on thee Bible - in fact, I have no interest in basing my argument on anything else. I understand that this is not palatable to an unbeliever who wishes to place all religions on an equal playing field and then supposedly complete an unbiased evaluation of the merits and demerits of each. Perhaps this is what you have done. Of course, you know that the Bible says that the human heart is inclined towards evil and that the natural man does not seek God - the natural man has a natural bent towards rejecting the God of scripture - anything else will do - be it Mormonism, Buddhism, Atheism, Deism, etc. So the Bible itself does not lend itself favourably (at all) with a comparison of other so-called sacred texts.
You ask where the empowering of the Holy Spirit is - well we know that not everyone has been appointed to be an evangelist. God has appointed some to be preachers, teachers, evangelists, etc. Not everyone has the gift of standing on a street corner and open-air preaching. Some thrive in those situations while some are more gifted towards discpling those who already profess Christ. The Bible no where teaches that we should expect to see all Christians zealously going from house-to-house proclaiming the good news like the Jehovah's Witnesses. In fact Paul exhorts the Thesallonians to lead a quiet life and to work with your hands - this hardly sounds like street preaching to me. But of course Paul hiimself was appointed as an apostle, and was specially gifted to preach, teach, and evangelize, and that's what he pursued.
Finally, you claim that you know you are good with God because of the natural revelation of God - that he is good and caring. What if you lived in a war-torn country? Would you have the same conviction? Probably not. What if your house was destoryed by a Tsunami? Probably not. There are many people in this world who lead exceedingly evil lives and yet live sumptuously, while pious people are afflicted every day. In Psalm 73 the psalmist bemoans this sad state of affairs and even questions if God actually cares about the affairs of his people - if they even are his people. The Psalmist concludes that only the scope of eternity and the final judgement will everything be made right.
Posted in: Where Are the Evangelicals?
Roger, thanks for your response. I suppose that if one really wanted to delve into the debate regarding each religion's authoritative texts one would have to really study each one. I know that my argumentation is based on thee Bible - in fact, I have no interest in basing my argument on anything else. I understand that this is not palatable to an unbeliever who wishes to place all religions on an equal playing field and then supposedly complete an unbiased evaluation of the merits and demerits of each. Perhaps this is what you have done. Of course, you know that the Bible says that the human heart is inclined towards evil and that the natural man does not seek God - the natural man has a natural bent towards rejecting the God of scripture - anything else will do - be it Mormonism, Buddhism, Atheism, Deism, etc. So the Bible itself does not lend itself favourably (at all) with a comparison of other so-called sacred texts.
You ask where the empowering of the Holy Spirit is - well we know that not everyone has been appointed to be an evangelist. God has appointed some to be preachers, teachers, evangelists, etc. Not everyone has the gift of standing on a street corner and open-air preaching. Some thrive in those situations while some are more gifted towards discpling those who already profess Christ. The Bible no where teaches that we should expect to see all Christians zealously going from house-to-house proclaiming the good news like the Jehovah's Witnesses. In fact Paul exhorts the Thesallonians to lead a quiet life and to work with your hands - this hardly sounds like street preaching to me. But of course Paul hiimself was appointed as an apostle, and was specially gifted to preach, teach, and evangelize, and that's what he pursued.
Finally, you claim that you know you are good with God because of the natural revelation of God - that he is good and caring. What if you lived in a war-torn country? Would you have the same conviction? Probably not. What if your house was destoryed by a Tsunami? Probably not. There are many people in this world who lead exceedingly evil lives and yet live sumptuously, while pious people are afflicted every day. In Psalm 73 the psalmist bemoans this sad state of affairs and even questions if God actually cares about the affairs of his people - if they even are his people. The Psalmist concludes that only the scope of eternity and the final judgement will everything be made right.