God has a bad reputation. Many think of God as wrathful and angry, smiting people for no apparent reason. But the story is more complicated than that. Without minimizing the sometimes harsh realities of the biblical record, David Lamb unpacks the complexity of the Old Testament and assembles an overall picture that gives coherence to our understanding of God in both Old and New Testaments.
A recent string of popular-level books written by the New Atheists have leveled the accusation that the God of the Old Testament is nothing but a bully, a murderer, and a cosmic child abuser. This viewpoint is even making inroads into the church. How are Christians to respond to such accusations? And how are we to reconcile the seemingly disconnected natures of God portrayed in the two testaments? In this timely and readable book, apologist Paul Copan takes on some of the most vexing accusations of our time, including: God is arrogant and jealous God punishes people too harshly God is guilty of ethnic cleansing God oppresses women God endorses slavery Christianity causes violence and more Copan not only answers God's critics, he also shows how to read both the Old and New Testaments faithfully, seeing an unchanging, righteous, and loving God in both.
Many Christians believe that they have to understand everything about their faith for that faith to be genuine. This isn't true. There are many things we don't understand about God, His Word, and His works. And this is actually one of the greatest things about the Christian faith: that there are areas of mystery that lie beyond the keenest scholarship or even the most profound spiritual exercises. Sadly, for many people these problems raise so many questions and uncertainties that faith itself becomes a struggle. But questions, and even doubts, are part of faith. Chris Wright encourages us to face the limitations of our understanding and to acknowledge the pain and grief they can often cause. In The God I Don't Understand, he focuses on four of the most mysterious subjects in the Bible and reflects upon why it's important to ask questions without having to provide the answer: The problem of evil and suffering. The genocide of the Canaanites. The cross and the crucifixion. The end of the world. "However strongly we believe in divine revelation, we must acknowledge both that God has not revealed everything and that much of what he has revealed is not plain. It is because Dr. Wright confronts biblical problems with a combination of honesty and humility that I warmly commend this book." —John Stott
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. Even Christians have a hard time stomaching such a thought, and many avoid reading those difficult Old Testament passages that make us squeamish. Instead, we quickly jump to the enemy-loving, forgiving Jesus of the New Testament. And yet, the question doesn't go away. Did God really command genocide? Is the command to "utterly destroy" morally unjustifiable? Is it literal? Are the issues more complex and nuanced than we realize? In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages. Pastors, youth pastors, campus ministers, apologetics readers, and laypeople will find that this book both enlightens and equips them for serious discussion of troubling spiritual questions.
Paul Froese explores the nature of religious faith in a provocative examination of the most massive atheism campaign in human history. That campaign occurred after the 1917 Russian Revolution, when Soviet plans for a new Marxist utopia included the total eradication of all religion. Even though the Soviet Union's attempt to secularize its society was quite successful at crushing the institutional and ritual manifestations of religion, its leaders were surprised at the persistence of religious belief. Froese's account reveals how atheism, when taken to its extreme, can become as dogmatic and oppressive as any religious faith and illuminates the struggle for individual expression in the face of social repression.
THE RESURRECTION AND IMMORTALITY Is man born with an immortal soul, or do the saved put on immortality at the resurrection? This is one of the most important questions of all times. It has more influence on our conception of our nature, our view of life in this world, and life after death, the nature of God, than any other question. The resurrection and an undying immortal soul are not compatible. If one is true, then the other one cannot be. YOUR WHOLE THEOLOGY [what you believe] IS DETERMINED BY YOUR VIEW OF THE SOUL. Not only does man now having an immortal soul make the resurrection impossible, it makes the judgment be passed; and the second coming of Christ pointless for there could not be a resurrection or a judgment at His coming. The resurrection doctrine of unconditional immortality are contradictory to each other. You must choose one or the other. You cannot believe both. Christ taught the resurrection. It is our only hope of life after death, not now having immortality and never dying. The undead cannot be raised. If the soul is immortal and never dies ----- there cannot be a resurrection of those not dead If there is to be a resurrection of the dead the dead cannot be alive, cannot be living immortal souls The doctrine of unconditional immortality: Changes the nature of God, makes Him cruel and sadistic Changes the message we preach to the lost and their fate, whether they will have an eternal life with torment or a second death form which there will never be a resurrection Changes the nature of man, whether he is now mortal or immortal Changes the nature of the resurrection of Christ, whether He was dead and raised by God or only His earthly body was dead and He justcame back from Heaven to it Changes the nature of our resurrection, whether we are dead and resurrected or just come back from somewhere The resurrection an immortal soul. The wages of sin is death the wages of sin is an eternal life of torment.
What is the basic point of this book? Theology makes a difference. The basic theology for addictions is that the root problem goes deeper than our genetic makeup. Addictions are ultimately a disorder of worship. Will we worship ourselves and our own desires or will we worship the true God?
Often, human perspective and the mechanics of Christianity eclipse the true nature of God -- the God Who wants nothing more than to share an intimate friendship with His children. If you're wondering who God is, or if He cares, let Andrew Wommack show you The True Nature of God.
As we near the Second-Coming, the battle between good and evil intensifies. Sadly, the forces of evil are winning; mainly because too many Christians and the churches they attend are going along to get along. They’ll stand for God—as long as they can do so in silence. If their “faith” costs them anything, they want no part of it. The Bible warns us that we must know the enemy, but most of us are clueless. It’s so much easier to bury our heads in the sand and act like everything is okay—even though we know it’s not. Our Lord and Savior died in this world so we can experience life-everlasting. Put another way, God allowed His Son to be treated like we deserve to be treated so we could be treated like His Son. Why? Because He loves us. In John 15:13 it is stated, Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. And in return for Christ’s sacrifice, most of us remain mute. We’ve quietly let Him be kicked out of our places of business, our schools, our government (at all levels), our courts, and in some cases our churches and homes. And then when we need Him, we, in unmitigated hypocrisy, call for a National Day of Prayer (for example: immediately after 9/11). The spiritual war we’re facing is almost at an end. What we do, or don’t do, will determine the outcome. Jesus said it best in Matthew 12:30, He who is not with Me is against Me. That’s about as simple and direct as it can get. The spiritual war we all face is raging, and acting as if we’re a neutral nation in WWII is no longer an option. The choice is ours. We either stand with Christ or we become His enemy.
Killing Sin is John Owen's Puritan classic Mortification of Sin updated for today. Owen tackles the age-old challenge for the Christian: how to put to death the power of sin over our lives. This is something that is impossible through man-centered self-help or self-denial. But with God all things are possible. Though we will never be completely free of sin while alive in this world, by putting our faith on Christ with an expectation of His help, the Holy Spirit will bring the His cross into our hearts with all its sin-killing power. Owen tells us why it is imperative for the Christian to be killing sin in his life, what it actually means to kill sin, why only a Christian can do it, why it is only possible through the power of the Holy Spirit, and how we can avail ourselves of the power of the Spirit to kill sin through gospel faith in the death and resurrection of Christ. Owen's original Mortification of Sin was written in 17th century English that is extremely difficult to understand. This Killing Sin translates Owen into contemporary English that is easy to read without dumbing it down so people today can read this very important book on a most critical topic.
