DAY 237

CHALLENGE

“The Catholic Church was created by the Emperor Constantine when he made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire.”

DEFENSE

Both of these claims are historically false.

Although Constantine is often credited with being the first Christian emperor, he didn’t make Christianity the official religion. What he did, together with his colleague and rival, Licinius, was issue the Edict of Milan in A.D. 313, which proclaimed religious toleration for Christianity among the other religions in the empire.

He also didn’t create the Catholic Church, which already ex…

DAY 236

CHALLENGE

“We don’t need the Church to identify Scripture. The Holy Spirit witnesses to it.”

DEFENSE

The Holy Spirit does witness to Scripture, but it does this through the instrumentality of the Church.

Although some have argued that Scripture is “self-authenticating” (see Day 229), they don’t usually mean this and instead appeal to another form of authentication.

Thus, after proposing the Bible’s literary qualities as evidence of divine authorship, the Westminster Confession of Faith goes on to say, “notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth, …

DAY 235

CHALLENGE

“Why would a good God allow people to be born with temptations to sin?”

DEFENSE

This is a subcase of the problem of evil. It’s mysterious, but we can still discern the outlines of the solution.

Elsewhere we have covered other aspects of the problem of evil (see Days 7, 38, and 151). Here we look at the specific question of why God allows people to be born with temptations to sin.

One way of putting the answer is: God created mankind in a state of original justice or holiness. However, when our first parents turned away from God and committed original sin, they lost …

DAY 234

CHALLENGE

“The Gospels contradict each other about whether Jesus healed the blind beggar Bartimaeus when he was entering or leaving Jericho.”

DEFENSE

There are several responses to this challenge.

To begin, let’s look at the texts describing where Jesus was when the event took place:

“As they went out of Jericho, a great crowd followed him” (Matt. 20:29).

“And they came to Jericho; and as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a great multitude, Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the roadside” (Mark 10:46).

“As he drew near to Jericho, a blin…

DAY 233

CHALLENGE

“Jesus never existed. The passage where Josephus refers to him is fake.”

DEFENSE

The passage in question is not a fake.

Most manuscripts of Josephus’s Antiquities of the Jews, written around A.D. 93, contain this passage:

Now, there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works—a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was Christ; and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him t…

DAY 232

CHALLENGE

“The Gospels contradict each other about which women went to Jesus’ tomb.”

DEFENSE

The Gospels simply record different details.

The following women are mentioned as going to the tomb:

Mary Magdalen and the “other Mary,” who is identified as “the mother of James and Joseph” (Matt. 28:1; cf. Matt. 27:56, 61)

Mary Magdalen, Mary the mother of James, and Salome (Mark 16:1)

Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them (Luke 24:10)

Mary Magdalen (John 20:1)

For a contradiction to exist, one Gospel would have to assert a particular woman …

DAY 231 

CHALLENGE

“The quantum mechanical argument is flawed: (1) There are other interpretations of quantum mechanics; (2) there could be more than one initial physical observer; (3) the first physical observer could be actualized by a physical observer from another universe; (4) a non- physical observer other than God could actualize the first physical observer; and (5) God doesn’t observe things the way we do.”

DEFENSE

None of these objections overturn the quantum mechanical argument.

First, there are different interpretations of quantum mechanics, but this is a legitimate interpretati…

DAY 230

CHALLENGE

“Modern physics undermines belief in the existence of God.”

DEFENSE

On the contrary, modern physics supports the existence of God.

Quantum mechanics is a branch of physics that studies very small phenomena like the behavior of subatomic particles. According to some interpretations of quantum mechanics, an argument supporting God’s existence may be constructed as follows:

The universe contains phenomena that appear to require a conscious observer to achieve a definite state.

These phenomena achieve definite states.

Therefore, there are conscious observers.

There canno…

DAY 229

CHALLENGE

“We don’t need the Church to help us identify Scripture. God’s word is self-authenticating.”

DEFENSE

This makes for good rhetoric but does not stand up to examination.

The word of God is powerful (Ps. 33:6; Eph. 6:17; Heb. 4:12), but this does not mean it is self-authenticating. Scripture records that even prophets could be mistaken about whether a word they heard came from God (1 Sam. 3:2–9).

Taken literally, the claim that Scripture is self-authenticating would mean that the text of Scripture has certain qualities that prove it to be (that is, authenticate it as) …

DAY 228

CHALLENGE

“The idea we can be justified at different points in our lives makes no sense.”

DEFENSE

Scripture unambiguously teaches that justification has past, present, and future dimensions.

The term “justify” (Greek, dikaoō) means to declare or make someone righteous. In the Protestant community, it is normal to think of justification only as an event at the beginning of the Christian life. And Scripture does sometimes speak of justification as a past event: “You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 6:11b).

But Scripture also speaks of justification as…