How can we know anything about anything
To try to explain truth to him who loves it not is but to give him more plentiful material for misinterpretation. George Macdonald
Do we have to make a choice between science and the Bible?
NO!
That is NOT where the problem is, but that is what everyone seems to want to talk about.
Take science as an example.
How can we know anything about the created material world around us?
How can we know anything from what we can see using natural sciences?
We all see the same things in the material world,
but we don't come to the same answers.
Why is that?
How can we know anything about the Bible and what it teaches?
Every person believes different things about the Bible and how it should be read.
Why is that?
Same scientific facts. Different answers.
Same Bible. Different answers.
Why is that?
The true question is this: How do we come to our answers that we get
from what we can see through science
or what we can read in the Bible?
How do we think about what we see using science or what we read in the Bible?
How do we analyze what we have seen and read?
How do we interpret what we have seen and read?
We use logic, but logic always has a foundation. Jesus talked about building on the Rock.
That Rock is Jesus Christ. He is the true foundation.
There are also the false foundations of the ungodly.
An example might help.
Question: Why do you believe in evolution?
Answer: Because my science teacher told me that evolution is scientific fact.
Question: Why do you believe your science teacher?
Answer: because he agrees with the textbook he assigned us to read.
Now, we have asked, "Why?" twice.
If we continued to ask, "Why?" we would come down to the foundation of this person's thoughts.
When we get down to the foundations, there are no more questions that can be answered.
So where to the foundations come from?
There are three possibilities.
- things that we make up, pulled from the air
- demonic lies
- divine revelation
Question: Why do you believe in creation?
Answer: Because God revealed this to me. He spoke to me through the Bible and gave me His faith
so that I could believe Him.
See how quickly we got to the foundation.
This is a belief that has a foundation that is solid and that cannot be moved.
In reality, the things that we make up, that are pulled from the air,
are actually from demons and all the lies of demons spring from the prince of demons, Satan.
So these are one and the same.
Divine revelation comes from the Almighty, Creator, God, Jesus Christ.
So there are only two choices, but how do we know there are only two choices?
Because God has revealed this truth to us.
The question then is how do we tell the difference between the revelation that comes from God
and the lies of Satan?
The answer is that everyone who sincerely wants to do the will of God will know.
Jesus said, "If you really want to obey God, you will know if what I teach comes from God or from me"
The rejection of the revelation that comes from God is not an intellectual problem.
It is a moral problem.
Jesus said, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you:
For everyone who asks receives; and he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks it shall be opened."
*
Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone?
Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?
If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children,
how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?
Matthew 7:7-11 *
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
You can set the truth before someone, but you can't make anyone believe
those things that they don't want to submit to.
They have to want to obey God.
How frequently it is brought to our attention that nothing good can be done if the will is wrong! Reason alone fails to justify itself. Richard M. Weaver
Jesus said, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32)
"If we are not prepared to buy the truth at the cost of our own humbling we shall not receive it"
Lies appear to have no price upon them.
They seem cheap and they abound everywhere.
But for the truth there is always an obvious price to pay.
"[God] has set a day when He will judge all the world's people with fairness.
And He has chosen the man Jesus to do the judging for Him.
God has given proof of this to all of us by raising Jesus from death" (Acts 17:31).
"There is a judge for the one who rejects Me [Jesus] and does not accept My words;
that very word which I spoke will condemn him at the last day" (John 12:48)
That also stands for every person who speaks the utterances of Jesus.
When we hear them, we hear Jesus Christ, and we either accept or reject.
Every person who follows Jesus Christ is commanded to only speak His utterances and not their own.
"When we love others, we know that we belong to the truth, and we feel at ease in the presence of God" (1 John 3:19)
Ravi Zacharias did two open forums in a university.
On the second night, one man told him that he had brought two Atheists in the night before
who said that the arguments presented were so strong that they could not contend with them,
but they were going to remain Atheists because that is what they prefer to be true.
In another case of just listening to an unbeliever and drawing out his reasoning,
the unbeliever finally came to his foundations.
They turned out to be assumptions that were pulled from the air.
When asked why he believed his basic assumption,
the unbeliever looked startled and blurted out,
"I guess I'm making the whole thing up."
It was quite a revelation to him since he hadn't even known that he had any assumptions.
However, he decided to remain an Atheist because he didn't want God to rule over him.
You are likely to hear this lie: "Churches come across as antagonistic to science." You are especially likely to hear this lie if you have children in the public schools or in a liberal "Christian" school.
The people who say such things have been deceived by a bit of illogical thinking. The human mind is not all that strong, so we shouldn't judge them. We could also be confused in the same way if we aren't careful. Never turn the discussion into a contest of who has the most pride. If you win such a contest, then you lose.
Talk to them. If they will receive your words, fine. If not, then let them go their way. God is very clear that every person who hears you when you speak by the Spirit of Christ does so be he or she wants to do the will of God. Those who don't want to do the will of God want to do their own will. Those who want to do their own will cannot accept the revelation that God gives through His word.
We know that the history in the Bible is correct because God reveals this to us. God uses the Bible to show this to us. God also speaks the same thing to us through the creation. God also reveals it through other ways. Even a young child knows, by openness to God, that things don't create themselves from nothing. God shows us that creation and the timeline in the Bible is the real science. Every part of creation proclaims it. A person must go through irrational mental gymnastics to believe otherwise. About half of the population of the United States has backslidden into believing in evolution. The other half believes in creation. In order to be a scientist and keep your job, the Atheists have discriminated against believers so that scientists who believe God must lie or lose their jobs. The fact that the prince of this present evil system, Satan, has taken over the courts, the media, the schools, and the system that controls who can have a well-paying job as a scientist should not cause us to becomes slaves of Satan.
Question it and then listen. Be gentle and give plenty of room to respond, but don't except nonsense as if it made sense. Don't embarrass the other person or get into an angry debate. They have probably been brainwashed and will be shocked that anyone would not just agree with them. They probably have never met an informed follower of Christ since many people who are following Christ don't even have enough compassion for their own children to learn about these things. The reason that you switch to neutral and into a listening mode is because the enemy of our souls has raised this attack to an emotional fever-pitch. A soft answer turns away wrath. If you have done your homework, then the truth will prevail. Keep in mind the real reason that you know that the person claiming, "Churches come across as antagonistic to science." is because they have been brainwashed and they want to fit in with the present evil ordered system. The system has been ordered by Satan and when they become a friend of this system they become an enemy of God, even if they wear the label, "Christian." Below are just a few examples of how the conversation may flow. Keep in mind that these are very compressed and leave out many of the things that you must do to maintain rapport with someone who is really emotional. Smile. Nod your head. Keep an open body language. Draw out each of these answers and listen with intent interest. When they can't answer, you can help them to keep from being embarrassed. Preface your questions with softening language. Instead of saying, "How are you defining the word, "science?" ask "I have heard people say this sort of thing before, and I always wonder how they are defining the word, "science." Could you help me understand? There are many ways to soften your questions and your statements. Rather than saying, "I disagree, and here is why . . ." ask a question in this way: "I understand what you are saying. Would you be willing to hear my reasoning for believing what the Bible says about this?"