Question I received today:

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”

Good question. Many people have the same objection and it is very understandable. In fact, one of my favorite teachers, the late Ronald Nash, used to say that if anyone rejects God for anything other than the problem of evil, his rejection is without excuse. However, what the objection above fails to recognize is the other option, “God is able to stop evil but not willing because the evil brings about a greater good of some sort.”

This is very common and finds many parallels in real life, from discipline of children to weight training. If God is the ultimate author of life and in control of all things, you would suspect that evil is allowed for a greater good. In fact, biblical Christianity would affirm that trials, pains, and tragic situations are working together for good for those that love God (Rom. 8:28). Look only to the situation of Joseph and the evil in his life. Sold into slavery, jail from being wrongly accused, hated by his brothers, etc. His perspective is that which we are taught to live by as Christians: [Joseph to his brothers who hated him sold him into slavery] “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive.” (Gen 50:20)

One thing that we cannot expect is to know why particular evils happen. Sometimes we will, but most of the time we won’t. We, as Christians, trust the Lord, leaving all things in his hands, truly believing he knows what he is doing even in the most difficult and, often, seemingly meaningless tragedies. One of our greatest temptations is to look at situations and evils and interpret them as evidence of God’s absence. Once we do this, we have conceded to the very antinomy of our faith—disbelief.

As I deal with the death of my sister and the disturbing debilitation of my mother, I am tempted to see meaninglessness. I am tempted to say “God cannot be involved.” I am tempted to place God on the stand and say “Until you give an account for this, I will no longer believe in or trust you.” But our faith does not entertain such tribunals. We are not simply those who believe in what Christ did: because of what he did, we trust in him for all things, even when we do not understand them.

Finally, we ground this belief in reality, not blind hope. We understand that if God created the world, acted in history, became incarnate, died on a cross and rose from the grave, then he is true to his word. This is why theology and the solidification of our beliefs is of vital importance. He is in control and he has a reason—a good and righteous reason—for the allowance of evil. We, like Job (who never understood why all the evil befell him) stand with our hands to our mouths (i.e., not accusing God) and trust the One who is more tender, just, and loving than we could ever imagine. We are convinced that the present evils are nothing to be compared to the glory that follows (Rom. 8:18).

I remind myself of this each day when I have to deal with my mother and her pain, the hardest situation that I have ever had to deal with.

I hope this understanding helps you, too.

The Credo House of Theology is well on the way. Get the latest updates here.

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Just think in a few weeks I will be saying that to the patrons of Credo House. Last call … for coffee that is.

For now though it is last call for the apologetics special we have been running.

It ends this weekend!

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In this series of posts I am going to write about God. “Wow! That is revolutionary for a theology blog: thanks for being so specific, Michael!” Slow down, you are already wearing me out. We are going to talk about God, but I want to focus on something that I believe is the most neglected aspect of theology proper (the formal doctrine of God) in the church today. This is a serious charge, but I don’t think I am overstating it. We will see . . .

I don’t want to deal with who is God; neither do I want to deal with what God has done. Here, I am going to focus on the “what” of God. What is God? In other words, what, essentially, makes God, God. What characteristics must a being have to be called “God”? Personality? Goodness? Activity in our lives? Power? Grace? Or could God lack these things and still be God in the proper sense? What does God have to be to be God?

This might sound rather unspiritual and beyond our ability when dealing with the ineffable (that which is incapable of being expressed), yet I contend that it is essential and should be among the prolegomena (”first words”) in the study of theology proper. What I mean by this is that if you don’t get this right, all other questions about God will suffer to a great degree. This will in turn affect your view of everything, from Christ to morality, from inspiration to eschatology, and much more.

(Stay with me . . . I will explain as we move forward. One step at a time.)

By the time this study is finished, I believe that we will have discovered that many of our understandings and concepts about God do not really qualify for the title. In other words, some people’s views of God lack essential qualifying properties for God to bear the name “God.” This is prevalent among Christian cults and other world religions.

However, I must preface these strong propositions with a confession: I don’t believe a person must have a perfect concept of God to be in a true relationship with him. This is a matter of discipleship, essential as it may be.

In short, I will be arguing for what is called “Classical Theism,” something that has been under heavy attack the last couple of decades. As usual, I will try to help you understand why those who are straying from the classical theistic tradition are doing so and why I believe they have taken a wrong turn. I will also join them in the challenge of classical theism at one point, so be ready. Continue Reading »

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In the next issue of Philosophia Christi, I will be revisiting the topic of Yahweh wars and the killing of the Canaanites. This article appears with two essays critical of the divine command to kill the Canaanites. This journal’s issue also contains articles discussing the topic of the moral status of Canaanite society and its religious practices as well as the alleged negative influence of religion. (To see abstracts of the articles, go here.)

The abstract for my article is as follows:

The divine command to kill the Canaanites is the most problematic of all Old Testament ethical issues. This article responds to challenges raised by Wes Morriston and Randal Rauser. It argues that biblical and extrabiblical evidence suggests that the Canaanites who were killed were combatants rather than noncombatants (“Scenario 1”) and that, given the profound moral corruption of Canaan, this divinely-directed act was just. Even if it turns out that noncombatants were directly targeted (“Scenario 2”), the overarching Old Testament narrative is directed toward the salvation of all nations–including the Canaanites.

My article is available here.

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I remember one time in 2001 my wife and I were driving from Dallas to Colorado Springs for the ETS conference. There was a sign that said “50 Miles to Colorado Springs.” She said that we were almost there. I said, “No, not really. The sign does not refer to the city limits, but to the central office within the city.” She responded with a surprise and smirk on her face, “No it doesn’t.” I don’t know why, it was just one of those days, but we argued for the next hour about this. The argument became so severe that we did not talk to each other for quite some time (seriously!). And you know what? I did not really know if I was right. But her reaction and distrust to my “knowledge” on this issue caused me to defend something that I was not even sure about. Her persistent argumentation gave me resolve to prove my case and somehow turned my uncertainty into absolute certainty. I was now committed to my position. I now had a certain emotionally based belief that I did not have before the argument took place.

Now, as childish and worthless as this argument was, every time we see one of those signs on the road, there is a distinct feeling that resurfaces of an old bitter debate. To this day, I don’t really know who was right or who was wrong. But I could very easily, based upon a commitment of my emotions and time given to this argument that day in 2001, pridefully continue in the same vein without either thinking about the non-importance of the issue or whether I am actually right.

Why do we do this? Because we feel obligated to defend our positions once taken. We don’t like to change. Not only this, but we think that we must always defend our position or we feel that our intelligence been conceded and our belief compromised. It is an issue of pride first, truth second.

Now let’s up the move to something more significant. My wife and I have also had arguments about more serious matters. We have argued about particulars on how to raise the children, finances, and issues with in-laws. We have even had some fairly severe theological disagreements. We could and – I am sad to say – do have ongoing disagreements that have not had a chance to rest, mentally and emotionally, from our pride. When these things surface, it is like an old wound that is opened and the injury that took place so long ago has not healed in the least. If this occurs, we are less prepared to confront the issues because we have not reflected upon it in a self-critical manner. In fact, we usually harden with regards to the issue. Continue Reading »

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This is the final installment of my Sola Scriptura series.
The previous posts (post crash) can be found here. Or you can download entire series in rough PDF.

UPDATE: I have already deleted about 10 comments today. Please don’t just spam with quotes from the church fathers. Had the poster who did read the entire series, he would have seen that the quotes used don’t argue against sola Scriptura, properly defined. So please, if you are going to engage, read the rest of the series. I don’t have the time to recreate all the previous posts so that others can get up to speed enough to engage here! Thanks for your attention to the blog rules as well.

I have attempted to present a balanced look at the Protestant doctrine of sola Scriptura. This is a doctrine that I hold to very strongly and believe is a sine qua non of Protestantism. What I mean by this is that this doctrine forms an essential bedrock of Reformation orthodoxy.

In the previous posts I have step by step attempted to defend this doctrine against competing models of authority held by both Catholics and (sometimes) Eastern Orthodox. But one of the most substantial claims that those who deny sola Scriptura make is that it does not find representation in the history of the church. In fact, Roman Catholics would argue that church history holds to a dual-source theory where unwritten tradition and Scripture are equal and the Magisterial authority of the Catholic church infallibly interprets both.

I agree that it would be a substantial argument if in the history of the church we cannot find the principles of sola Scriptura being held, but this is simply not the case. I offer two arguments here:

1. To require that one produce an articulated view of sola Scriptura in history is anachronistic. An anachronism is where one enforces a contemporary articulation of an idea or use of a word on an ancient audience. This is not unlike what many Christian cults do with the doctrine of the Trinity. They ask orthodox Christians to produce historical verification for the Trinity prior to 325 A.D. (the date of the Council of Nicea, when the Trinity was articulated in its near current form). They are not looking for seeds of the principle beliefs, but an actual articulation. Expecting to find the doctrine of sola Scriptura commits the same type fallacy. Both suffer from the same presumption that if something is true, we will find it in its current articulated form from the beginning. This assumption is unjustified and finds no parallel in any other discipline.

The doctrine of sola Scriptura as defined in this series was explained and articulated as such precisely because of the controversies of the 16th century. Search all you will and you will not find the phase “sola Scriptura” before the Reformation just as you won’t find the word “Trinity” commonly used before Nicea. But, in both cases, I do believe you will find the doctrine in seed form. In other words, the doctrine of sola Scriptura was undeveloped before the Reformation, but it was present in its undeveloped form. Continue Reading »

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This is an Easter updated repost—Happy Easter!

Download PDF (with family discussion questions)

I have an interest in the death of the Apostles. We all should. Every Christian should spend some time looking into the historical records. There are many legends concerning their deaths which makes the historical evidence hard to interpret. Many times the accounts conflict with one another. Most early Christians wanted their home to be crowned with the stature of having been the final resting place of one of the twelve. It is probably for this reason that there were embellishments forged.

Sifting through the wheat and the chaff is not easy task. The martyrdom of some of the Apostles is more certain than others. Historians will have different degrees of certainty concerning the circumstances of their deaths. For instance, unbiased historians will not take issue with the historical credibility of the martyrdom of Peter, Paul, and James the Apostle. Many of the other accounts have decent historic validity as well. Some accounts, however, raise the eyebrow and cause us to remain agnostic.

However, when boiled down to their least common denominator, it is very feasible to believe that all but one of the Apostles suffered and died a martyr’s death, even if we can’t be sure of the exact details.

Amidst some uncertainty, one thing is clear—the reason given for their death was the same in all accounts. They were killed because they proclaimed to have seen Christ die and then to have seen Him alive. They all died because of an unwavering, unrelenting claim that Christ rose from the grave. They died for Easter.

Personally, in my mind, the gruesome death of the Apostles as recorded below was one of the greatest gifts that God ever gave to the Church. It contributes much to Christian apologetics by answering the “how do you know?” question concerning the resurrection of Christ.

The following is my attempt to take the best of all the sources and share the most likely scenario for each Apostle’s death. At the risk of spoiling some of the “legends,” I have given each account a grade of probability from A (highest probability) to D (lowest probability).

Read through the accounts of their deaths. Use it this Easter. Tell your children. This may sound odd, but in a very real sense, I thank God for bringing about the Apostles’ deaths, for in their deaths they sealed their testimony in blood making our faith in the risen Christ built upon a solid foundation.

(1) The Apostle James

James, the Apostle of the Lord, was the second recorded martyr after Christ’s death (Stephen was the first). His death is recorded in Acts 12:2 where it is told that Herod Agrippa killed him with a sword. Clemens Alexandrinus and Eusebius (Ecclesiastical History II.2) both tell how the executioner witnessed the courage and un-recanting spirit of James and was then convinced of Christ resurrection and was executed along with James.

Date of Martyrdom: 44-45 A.D.

Probability rating: A for the death of James, C- for the death of the executioner

(2) The Apostle Peter

Although, just before the crucifixion, Peter denied three times that he even knew Christ, after the resurrection he did not do so again. Peter, just as Jesus told him in John 21:18-19, was crucified by Roman executioners because he could not deny his master again. According to Eusebius, he thought himself unworthy to be crucified as his Master, and, therefore, he asked to be crucified “head downward.”

Date of Martyrdom: ca. 64 A.D.

Probability rating: A Continue Reading »

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One of the most interesting passages in the Bible relating to defending the faith is Romans 1:18-19, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth by their unrighteousness, because what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.” What makes this interesting to me as an apologist is that it says unbelievers do not lack information; that is not the fundamental issue. Rather, the issue is self-deceit, since they know the truth but suppress it. Apologetics, then, reveals the self-deceit of unbelievers. But can people really deceive themselves so profoundly?

The answer is yes. Consider Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a medical doctor and creator of the world’s most famous detective, Sherlock Holmes. The methods Conan Doyle armed Holmes with were so sensible that some of them were actually adopted by Scotland Yard. And Conan Doyle himself was consulted on several cases as if he shared the abilities of his fictional creation. If ever there was a man who could think logically about the facts of a case and arrive at a plausible solution it was Conan Doyle.

But when his son died in World War I, Conan Doyle turned to Spritualism for consolation in hopes of making contact with him through mediums. Sir Arthur became so involved in spiritualism he became its most famous evangelist in the 1920’s, doing speaking tours to promote it.

It was on one of these speaking tours that Conan Doyle was introduced to magic’s most famous magician, Houdini. Houdini had begun a crusade against Spiritualism because he recognized the so-called mediums were really unscrupulous magicians taking advantage of grieving and emotionally distraught people. Indeed, early in his career Houdini had posed as a medium and regretted the damage he had done. Despite their differences a friendship was formed and the two families even vacationed together. Continue Reading »

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“Don’t be misled by his theology. All the person does is lie. He is a liar.”

Ever heard that? Ever said that?

The other day, I saw a blog titled, “More Lies from Reclaiming the Mind Ministries.” Ouch! I did not know I was lying.

I am reminded of the EMF song in the 90’s, “You said to much, and what you said it was a lie.”

The proposition is this: Whenever someone teaches something you disagree with, the rhetoric employed to combat such is accusations of lies. In other words, if someone does not teach the truth in your opinion, they are lying. No question about it.

If I was to employ such rhetoric, here is how I might sound:

Mormons are liars. They all seek to lead people to hell.

Roger Olson (who is an Arminian) is a liar. His book about Arminian theology is full of misdirection.

Sam Storms (who is a Charismatic) is a liar. He seeks only to deceive.

Robert Thomas (who believes in ipsissima verba) is a liar. Don’t listen to his lies.

Francis Beckwith (who is a Roman Catholic) is a turncoat liar. Don’t follow him in his attempts to undermine truth.

Gregory Boyd (who is an Open Theist) is a liar. He is trying to pull everyone into his deception.

I. Howard Marshall (who does not believe in inerrancy) is a liar. He seeks to distort God’s authority.

William Lane Craig (who is a Molinist) is a liar. He has been at the misleading game for some time.

You see. All of these people are those with whom I would have some theological disagreements, major and minor. Since I am right and they are wrong about the issues (according to me), they must be liars. That is the only solution, right?

Be careful with such rhetoric. Be very, very careful. Continue Reading »

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I’ve been doing an occasional series on spiritual mentors who have greatly impacted my life. I talked about Joe Aldrich, a man who had a huge influence on my life in my late teens and early twenties, helping to set me in the direction of going to seminary, and Dallas Seminary in particular. And his transparency and real-life Christianity was obviously attractive to me and it modeled for me how I should live. I saw in Joe especially how vital a strong, open, vulnerable prayer life was.

Then, I spoke of Harold Hoehner, a surrogate father for me while a student at Dallas Seminary, and a wise man whose sense of humor coupled with deep scholarship and demands on his students to do their best for Christ’s glory motivated me to do better than I ever thought I could. As well, over several decades Hoehner single-handedly influenced Dallas Seminary policies for the better in numerous categories. He often was the lone naysayer in faculty meetings, but he was a purist when it came to doing the right thing. To see a man stand up in the midst of very godly, wise people and take the contrarian line was shocking at first. But I soon learned that his views were thought through very carefully and that he saw with 20/20 vision where certain policies would take us. I learned courage—based on deep discernment—from him in contexts in which his opponents could be very good people with less than the best ideas.

The last person I discussed was my mother, Nayda Wallace, who was my primary spiritual teacher through childhood. Her no-nonsense approach to facing responsibilities (something that Dad had a HUGE impact on as well), and her deep concern for her children coupled with attempts to instill common sense in us was a marvelous heritage she bequeathed us. I sometimes think that my folks believe that if everyone just faced their responsibilities, the world would be a perfect place. Obviously, that’s reaching a bit. But they did instill in me a deeply ingrained sense that I must never shirk from my responsibilities. And if I did, I would always face the consequences. I learned that to bargain for one’s children to keep them from facing their responsibilities, and facing consequences when they did not, is one of the worst things that parents can do. Too bad most parents don’t have a clue how destructive protecting their kids from the world can be because it keeps them from facing the consequences of their actions. Continue Reading »

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I was discussing religion with a gentleman this evening. It was a very interesting conversation in which he recounted to me how he used to be a Christian in a Baptist church. But he left Christianity for Buddhism not too long ago. He explained that the reason why he left Christianity was because of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. In short, he felt that Christians were on the wrong side of this issue.

This is representative of so many in our cultural Christianity. This gentleman’s argument was simple:

Christianity is determined as valid or invalid upon the character of its adherents.

In other words, if Christians do not act a “good” way, then Christianity itself is discredited. In this man’s mind, Christians were on the wrong side of the conflict, therefore he left Christianity for something more suitable in keeping with the character that he supposed should accompany those who follow the true God.

I am going to make a statement here that I suppose is going to make many of my readers upset. This especially goes for those who are more “emerging” in their thinking. Here it goes:

Christianity is not validated upon the character of its adherents.

Did you get that? Let me repeat.

Christianity is not validated upon the character of its adherents. Continue Reading »

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In the quest for political correctness over the last two decades one of the primary battlegrounds has been centered around Christmas. The phrase “Merry Christmas” and all the public displays associated with it have been considered offensive for a variety of reasons. Pluralists object because it is exclusivistic, those who hold to other faiths feel slighted or left out, and many atheists simply object to all public religious displays. For these people Christmas is so offensive it needs to be cleansed from our vocabulary so that the “Christmas Spirit” (whatever that is) can be ascribed to just about anything that can qualify for the phrase “Happy Holidays.” At best, the sacred is replaced by the sentimental.

Christians, on the other hand, often find it hard to understand what could possibly be offensive about celebrating the birth Jesus, the Prince of Peace. After all, he is the incarnation of a loving God who came into the world as a savior. What’s so offensive about that? The answer is: EVERYTHING! Continue Reading »

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[Doug Powell is a guest author and apologist.  His website can be found at www.dougpowell.com]

Just in time for the 2008 Christmas season, the American Humanist Association launched a new ad campaign with the message “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake.” The ads feature a Christmas motif with their snowflakes and green and red lettering, and some even picture a guy in a Santa suit. But the campaign slogan reveals a confusion about the nature of morality.

According to Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association, “Humanists have always understood that you don’t need a god to be good. Morality doesn’t come from religion. It’s a set of values embraced by individuals and society based on empathy, fairness, and experience.” The interesting thing about this statement is that Speckhardt characterizes empathy and fairness as good, but he doesn’t say why these things are good. And that is the real question: What makes good things good? What grounds morality?

There are only two possible sources for morality: God or human beings. If, as the American Humanist Association claims, morality is grounded in human beings and their experience, then some very serious problems arise. The first problem is that it justifies societies that are clearly morally wrong, such as Nazi Germany. If morality is “a set of values embraced by society based on empathy, fairness, and experience,” then Nazi Germany did nothing wrong. Being empathetic does not mean doing good to someone, only understanding their feelings. And the Nazis were fair – all Jews were sent to concentration camps. The morality of their society cannot be condemned by our society since their society simply embraced values that differ from ours. Continue Reading »

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In a recent SBL Forum, Tony Burke charges conservative scholars with doing bad historical research, biased in the extreme against the apocryphal gospels in particular. The provocative title of his essay is “Heresy Hunting in the New Millennium” (Tony Burke, ” Heresy Hunting in the New Millennium,” SBL Forum , n.p. [cited Aug 2008]. Online:http://sbl-site.org/Article.aspx?ArticleID=787). He picks on several known scholars who have brought their scholarship to the marketplace. Burke especially charges them with being apologetically driven in such a way that they are prejudiced against reading the ancient apocryphal gospels fairly: “Proper research and sober argument take a back seat to the apologists’ goal of buttressing the faith.”

Those who are singled out for criticism are Darrell Bock, Craig Evans, Gordon L. Heath, Philip Jenkins, Timothy Paul Jones, J. Ed Komoszewski, Stanley Porter, Ben Witherington III, and N. T. Wright.

The arguments that Burke uses often reflect his own strong biases, of which he seems to be unaware, for virtually everything that he criticizes among these authors can also be said about modern-day defenders of early heterodox Christianity. The response by Rob Bowman (http://www.religiousresearcher.org/blog/?p=54#more-54) displays this point for point.

I would hope that we could dialogue on the real issues of substance about the historical Jesus rather than allege that a person can’t possibly be telling the truth because he or she has an opinion about a particular ancient source. Why is it that evangelicals are frequently alone in their recognition that all of us come with biases when it comes to Jesus, but that we all have something to contribute and that we can all learn from one another? I guess historical positivism isn’t dead yet.

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The horse and water illustration that follows is taken from Millard Erickson’s book Postmodernizing the Faith. I use this and expland.

How should Christians engage a postmodern, post-Christian, post-evangelical world?

Horse=postmodern
Water=the Gospel
Rope=method of delivery

Question: How do we lead a postmodern horse to water?

Option 1: Deny the horse is really postmodern. No one can be a consistent postmodern. We simply need to convince them of the untenability of their professing worldview and show them how they don’t hold to it in reality.

Option 2: Convert the horse from being postmodern. Create common ground in epistemology (the way we come to know truth), then they will be able to drink the water.

Option 3: Change the rope. Christians need to change the communication method and style for a postmodern audience, being sensitive to the ethos of our culture.

Option 4: Change the water. The water we are calling “Gospel” today may not represent the true Gospel due to traditional folk theology and misinformation. Therefore, the water needs to be “purified.” Continue Reading »

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Protestantism is not perfect. No informed Protestant would claim such. Evangelicalism has major problems. This is nothing new. But Protestants have always thought the strengths of Protestantism outweigh the weaknesses. Otherwise, we would not be Protestant!

While I often write about the weaknesses of our system, sometimes complaining about Evangelical shames, I want to do something different here. I am going to give a short list of what I believe to be the major strengths of Protestantism:

1. Celebration of diversity: Protestants can appreciate and celebrate the diversity in the Christian faith unlike any other tradition. Whether it be in worship style or liturgy, house churches or mega churches, Protestant recognize that all people are not alike in their subjective preferences. Protestantism, as a movement, cannot dogmatize the way people should be in areas that are based in non-essential personal preferences. We can recognize that God has created people differently—and this was intentionally. If people have a personality that does not respond well to one style of worship, they are free to celebrate their diversity without feeling the obligation of adapting their style to some traditional norm. Therefore, to be Protestant is to be able to celebrate diversity. Continue Reading »

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Here is the Apologetics course that Rob Bowman taught last semester. Please feel free to listen or download. It is the entire course! (here is the syllabus if you want it)

Enroll in the Methods of Apologetics online course taught by Rob Bowman that starts next week.

For some reason the podpress plugin will not let me post them all the same way so the rest are just links here: (right-click to download) Continue Reading »

</p> <p>For some reason the podpress plugin will not let me post them all the same way so the rest are just links here: (right-click to download) <a href="http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2008/08/apologetics-course-with-rob-bowman/#more-558" class="more-link">Continue Reading &#187;</a></p> ">

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