Day 227

CHALLENGE

‘The Old Testament teaches polytheism.  Genesis says that ’elohim (Hebrew for ‘gods’) created the world.”

DEFENSE

Context makes it clear this refers to a single God.

Hebrew has different words for “God/god.” These include ’el, ’eloah, and ’elohim. The first two have a singular grammatical form, while ’elohim has a plural grammatical form (indicated by the –im ending).

However, grammatical form doesn’t determine meaning. Usage does. Consequently, many languages have words used differently than their grammatical form would suggest.

Thus the English word “species” has …

DAY 226

CHALLENGE

“The Gospels contradict one another regarding Peter’s three denials: (1) Mark has the cock crowing twice, but the other Gospels only once; (2) the dialogue used by Peter and his accusers differs; and (3) the people making the accusations are different.”

DEFENSE

None of these involve contradictions.

First, roosters crow multiple times at every dawn. Mark 14:72 mentions the second crowing specifically, and the others streamline the account for simplicity (see Day 37).

Second, no transcriptionist was present, and the dialogue is based on Peter and John’s memories (they b…

DAY 225

CHALLENGE

“The Gospel of Luke contradicts Acts on the Ascension. Luke says it happened at Bethany on the same day as the Resurrection; Acts says it happened on the Mount of Olives forty days after.”

DEFENSE

Neither is a contradiction.

First, let’s look at the texts involved in the place of the Ascension:

Then he led them out as far as Bethany . . . and was carried up into heaven (Luke 24:50–51).

He was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. . . . Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet (Acts 1:9, 12).

This solution simply requires a little kn…

DAY 224

CHALLENGE

“Mary says, ‘My spirit rejoices in God my Savior’ (Luke 1:47). This means that she was a sinner and couldn’t have been immaculately conceived.”

DEFENSE

God can save a person in multiple ways, and Mary was saved by God in more than one sense.

Salvation from the eternal consequences of sin only comes into focus with the ministry of Jesus. Prior to this, the Bible is overwhelmingly concerned with salvation from temporal calamities (war, disease, famine, death, and so on). We may refer to this as temporal salvation.

This seems to be what Mary has in mind. She says she rej…

DAY 223

CHALLENGE

“Purgatory contradicts the finished work of Christ. If Christ paid for all our sins on the cross, there is nothing left to be done.”

DEFENSE

Christ’s work is finished, but it’s not applied all at once.

Christ died on the cross “once for all” (Heb. 10:10), but the resulting grace is applied to us over the course of the Christian life.

Sometimes, a grace is given to us instantaneously. When we first come to God to be forgiven and justified, we receive these graces in-stantaneously.

But even after being forgiven and justified, we still struggle with sin and its consequ…

DAY 222

CHALLENGE

“The Catholic Church is wrong to say we’re justified by faith and works.”

DEFENSE

The Church doesn’t use “by faith and works” as an overall summary of how we are justified.

It’s not to be denied that some individual Catholics do this, but that’s not the same thing as the Magisterium of the Church doing it:

The Church’s most authoritative and key historical document on justification is the Council of Trent’s Decree on Justification, and the phrase “justified by faith and works” never appears in it.

The Church’s most important and authoritative presentation of the fait…

DAY 221

CHALLENGE

“Babies don’t believe in God. They are born atheists. So atheism is the natural condition of mankind.“

DEFENSE

This claim is based on a misunderstanding of what atheism is.

People can have a number of attitudes toward any proposition:

They may never have considered the proposition.

They may have considered it but neither affirm nor deny it.

They may affirm the proposition.

They may deny the proposition.More specific attitudes are also possible based on how strongly one affirms or denies a proposition (e.g., holding that it is certain, all but certain, very likely, …

DAY 220

CHALLENGE

“The Gospels’ claim that Pilate customarily released a criminal at Passover is fiction. We have no records of this ever happening.”

DEFENSE

We do have records: the four Gospels.

We don’t have an extrabiblical record that says, “Pilate customarily released a prisoner at Passover,” but that’s hardly surprising. Releasing a prisoner at the Jewish capital on a Jewish feast would be a purely local custom, and we don’t have detailed records of the Roman administration in Judaea. The surviving sources are too patchy for that.

However, leaders often pardon popular prisoners t…

DAY 219

CHALLENGE

“Passages like Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1, which refer to ‘Our God and Savior, Jesus Christ,’ do not prove the divinity of Christ. The authors are referring to God and Jesus separately.”

DEFENSE

That’s not how New Testament Greek grammar works.

In 1798, the Englishman Granville Sharp published a book in which he identified a rule of Greek grammar that has since become known as Granville Sharp’s rule. It has a direct bearing on the interpretation of Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1.

The rule focuses on New Testament Greek phrases like the one translated “Our God and Savior…

DAY 218

CHALLENGE

“Christians are a bunch of hypocrites.”

DEFENSE

Yes. And?

Consciousness of the fact that we don’t think and act the way we should is a human universal. So is the desire for others to think well of us. Everyone wishes to save face and, at one time or another, either shades the truth or flat out lies to appear better than he is. This makes hypocrisy another human universal, and it applies to Christians and everyone else.

When confronted with the fact that we don’t live up to our moral standards, we have several options. One—which is not good at all—is to abandon our sta…