The New Testament contains the markings of being authentic because it includes numerous details that reflect poorly on those who wrote it and on Jesus. Moreover, the writers were willing to die for their claims, and they were in a position to know if they were true or not.Audio

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Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. (0:12) Last week, we talked about the Bible and some reasons we should trust it. One of those reasons and types of testimony was early testimony. What is written in the New Testament was written very close to the events that it describes in terms of time. However, we also talked about eye-witness testimony, that what was written was either written by eye-witnesses or people who talked with eye-witnesses. Well, today we're going to continue on with those previous two E's and talk about three more E's: embarrassing testimony, excruciating testimony, and extra-biblical testimony. (0:47) So, embarrassing testimony. One thing we talked about when we talked about the Resurrection was the principle of embarrassment, and it simply says that any details embarrassing to the author are probably true. You're not going to make up things that make yourself look bad. And yet, the New Testament writers include numerous details that do not portray themselves in a positive light. For instance, the Gospel writers are dim-witted. Numerous times, they failed to understand what Jesus is saying to them. They're even uncaring and they write this down for us to see. They fall asleep on Jesus twice when He asked them to pray. Let's re-sensitize ourself to maybe what's actually going on here. They believe that God incarnate is standing in front of them and tells them to pray. And they fall asleep. That's embarrassing enough. But they write it down and it's preserved well enough for us to read 2,000 years later. You're not going to write down that you fell asleep when God told you pray unless it happened. But it gets worse! Peter's actually called Satan by Jesus. How would that actually have gone if they're making this up? Let's say they're sitting around the campfire, and Mark is saying, "Hey Peter, there's a great plot twist here. I'm going to have Jesus call you Satan." What worse name could there be for God to call you than Satan? Frank Turek has pointed this out in the past and I find it extremely persuasive and powerful. You're not going to have God calling you Satan unless it actually happened. And even then you might not write it down. They're also called cowards and they're doubters, and they write this down for us to see. (2:23) But there are also embarrassing things in the New Testament about Jesus. For starters, He's considered out of His mind by His mother and His brothers. Now, why would you include that in the document intended to get people to believe in this guy named Jesus unless it were true? And even if it were true, why would you include that His family basically wanted to Baker Act Him? They didn't think He was God, they thought He was crazy! But they include that for us. And that's extremely helpful because, when we come to see that after Jesus' Resurrection and ascension, James is part of the New Testament church and ultimately becomes one of the leaders of it. Well, this guy went from, "my brother's crazy", to "my brother's God." What could convince him of that? Well, the Resurrection. (3:09) But there are other embarrassing things about Jesus too. He's called a drunkard. That's not a good title if you're claiming to be God. He has His feet wiped with…

This week, we look stronger evidence for the Bible. The Bible was written using eyewitness testimony, and that testimony was recorded close to the events it describes.    Audio

Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic; a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. This week we're going to continue on in our series about the Bible. And we're going to look at eye-witness and early evidence for the New Testament. When it comes to early evidence, we're talking about manuscripts that were written shortly after the events that they describe took place. We actually have 5,800 handwritten Greek manuscripts of the New Testament and this doesn't include the thousands of Latin and Coptic manuscripts we also have. Some of the earliest manuscripts we have were discovered between 1946 and 1956, with the discovery of the Dead See Scrolls. This was a discovery of manuscripts in the MIddle East that were remarkably preserved in caves and in jars, that contained some very early copies of some of the New Testament documents. For instance, parts of Mark, Acts, Romans, 1 Timothy, 2 Peter, and James date within 50-70 AD. That's within 20-40 years of Jesus' death. And these are copies. So the originals would have to be older than that. Closer to the original events. We also have the earliest parts of John that date between 117 and 138. (1:25) So what does this show? This shows that the things that were written about the New Testament and the copies we have of the New Testament were written very close to when the actual events happened. (1:36) Something historians use is something called a copy time gap, and that's the length of time that elapsed between when an event happened and the earliest copy we have. For the New Testament, in some places this is 25 years. Let's compare this to other ancient documents. Like Homer, which has a copy time gap of 500 years. Or Plato, which has a copy time gap of 1200 years. Now, Homer and Plato are both taught in universities today, and there isn't a lot of question that what these copies describe match the originals. But, for some reason when it comes to the New Testament, people want to say that 25 years is way to long for things to have been written down and written down accurately. But as we'll come to see, that's not a justified critique. (2:24) So, the number of copies we have is also remarkable. For the New Testament, like I said, 5,800 Greek manuscripts. For Homer, 1757. For Caesar, 210. For Plato, also 210. So we have so many more copies for the New Testament than Homer, Caesar, Plato, Pliny the Younger, many other ancient documents. And yet, people want to say that we can't know what the original said with any certainty. But they don't make this claim about Homer, Caesar, or Plato, or others. (2:57) So, the evidence we have is early for the New Testament. The things that were written down, like we said, Mark, 1 and 2 Peter, John, all of these copies we have are just a short time after the oringials were penned. This should give us great confidence that what they describe is accurate. (3:15) So that's the first E. We're going to be looking at 5 or 6 E's over the next few weeks. And the first one is early testimony. Frank Turek, who's an apologist, has come up with these E's. All of the lines of evidence that we'll look at for the New Testament are going to start with E. An easy way to remember them. (3:35) So the first one is early. The second one is eye-witness testimony. Peter says in Acts, "God has raised this Jesus to life, and we were all witnesses of this fact." Eye-witnesses, they…

This week, we look stronger evidence for the Bible. The Bible was written using eyewitness testimony, and that testimony was recorded close to the events it describes.    Audio

Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic; a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. This week we're going to continue on in our series about the Bible. And we're going to look at eye-witness and early evidence for the New Testament. When it comes to early evidence, we're talking about manuscripts that were written shortly after the events that they describe took place. We actually have 5,800 handwritten Greek manuscripts of the New Testament and this doesn't include the thousands of Latin and Coptic manuscripts we also have. Some of the earliest manuscripts we have were discovered between 1946 and 1956, with the discovery of the Dead See Scrolls. This was a discovery of manuscripts in the MIddle East that were remarkably preserved in caves and in jars, that contained some very early copies of some of the New Testament documents. For instance, parts of Mark, Acts, Romans, 1 Timothy, 2 Peter, and James date within 50-70 AD. That's within 20-40 years of Jesus' death. And these are copies. So the originals would have to be older than that. Closer to the original events. We also have the earliest parts of John that date between 117 and 138. (1:25) So what does this show? This shows that the things that were written about the New Testament and the copies we have of the New Testament were written very close to when the actual events happened. (1:36) Something historians use is something called a copy time gap, and that's the length of time that elapsed between when an event happened and the earliest copy we have. For the New Testament, in some places this is 25 years. Let's compare this to other ancient documents. Like Homer, which has a copy time gap of 500 years. Or Plato, which has a copy time gap of 1200 years. Now, Homer and Plato are both taught in universities today, and there isn't a lot of question that what these copies describe match the originals. But, for some reason when it comes to the New Testament, people want to say that 25 years is way to long for things to have been written down and written down accurately. But as we'll come to see, that's not a justified critique. (2:24) So, the number of copies we have is also remarkable. For the New Testament, like I said, 5,800 Greek manuscripts. For Homer, 1757. For Caesar, 210. For Plato, also 210. So we have so many more copies for the New Testament than Homer, Caesar, Plato, Pliny the Younger, many other ancient documents. And yet, people want to say that we can't know what the original said with any certainty. But they don't make this claim about Homer, Caesar, or Plato, or others. (2:57) So, the evidence we have is early for the New Testament. The things that were written down, like we said, Mark, 1 and 2 Peter, John, all of these copies we have are just a short time after the oringials were penned. This should give us great confidence that what they describe is accurate. (3:15) So that's the first E. We're going to be looking at 5 or 6 E's over the next few weeks. And the first one is early testimony. Frank Turek, who's an apologist, has come up with these E's. All of the lines of evidence that we'll look at for the New Testament are going to start with E. An easy way to remember them. (3:35) So the first one is early. The second one is eye-witness testimony. Peter says in Acts, "God has raised this Jesus to life, and we were all witnesses of this fact." Eye-witnesses, they…

Should we trust the Bible because it gives us a good feeling when we read it, or because it changes lives? How should we deal with the claim that we can't trust the Bible because it's only written by men?Audio

 Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. Today, we're going to talk about the Bible. We're going to examine some reasons that are common for why people trust the Bible. And we'll see, are they good reasons?(0:23) But the first thing that must be said, is that in order for the Bible to be true, truth must exist. And this is why, a couple of weeks back, we talked about truth, and two views on it. Is it subjective, is it about me and my preferences and my opinions and my thoughts? Or is it objective, is it about something that's outside of myself, that accurately reflects reality? (0:44) Well, in order for the Bible to be true in any type of helpful way, it must be objectively true. It can't just be my opinion or preference or thought. And so, for the next few weeks we're going to look at how to make a case for the truthfulness, the objective truthfulness, of the Bible. (1:01) Well, there are two views on how you should view the truthfulness of the Bible. The first is simply that you presuppose that the Bible is true. You could call this a presuppositionalist view. It's a big word, maybe not that helpful. But, some people, as their starting position, say the Bible is true. It's not a conclusion, it's a starting position. And on this view, Divine authority is accepted unconditionally by Supernaturally-endowed faith.(1:29) So, someone who holds this view would say that their faith enables them to unconditionally accept that the Bible is true. That they don't need evidence. And if we try to reason with people, we're putting reason over God. Now that sounds really compelling. No one wants to put something over God, right? Well here's the thing, such an argument, saying "if we try to reason with people, we're putting reason over God," well, that seems pretty much the same as saying, "well in order to read the Bible, you need to know language and how to read, so we're putting language and reading over God." That doesn't make much sense there.(2:04) And in order to actually understand what Scripture says, we have to use reason. You use reason all the time, when you read a statement and you realize that statement means what it says and not it's opposite. And you come to understand how two different statements fit together. That's using reason. So, I don't find the whole, "reason over God" argument very compelling.(2:27) Additionally, someone who presupposes the Bible is true is probably going to reject all attempts to independently verify that the Bible is true. Because sinful, rational man has no legitimate standard that we could test God, or His revelation by. (2:43) So that's the first view. A presupposing, a presuppositionalist view. And on the other end of the spectrum would be the idea that you could prove the Bible. And you could do this by historical and logical arguments. There are some notable people who have used this approach and have actually come to Christianity because of it. Josh McDowell, who wrote Evidence that Demands a Verdict. Lee Strobel, who wrote A Case for Christ, A Case for Faith, and many other Cases. Jay Warner Wallace, who was a cold-case homicide detective, who set out to prove Christianity wrong and Atheism true, and was actually converted to Christianity in the process. He wrote a book called Cold Case Christianity. Nancy Pearcey, who …

Should we trust the Bible because it gives us a good feeling when we read it, or because it changes lives? How should we deal with the claim that we can't trust the Bible because it's only written by men?Audio

 Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. Today, we're going to talk about the Bible. We're going to examine some reasons that are common for why people trust the Bible. And we'll see, are they good reasons?(0:23) But the first thing that must be said, is that in order for the Bible to be true, truth must exist. And this is why, a couple of weeks back, we talked about truth, and two views on it. Is it subjective, is it about me and my preferences and my opinions and my thoughts? Or is it objective, is it about something that's outside of myself, that accurately reflects reality? (0:44) Well, in order for the Bible to be true in any type of helpful way, it must be objectively true. It can't just be my opinion or preference or thought. And so, for the next few weeks we're going to look at how to make a case for the truthfulness, the objective truthfulness, of the Bible. (1:01) Well, there are two views on how you should view the truthfulness of the Bible. The first is simply that you presuppose that the Bible is true. You could call this a presuppositionalist view. It's a big word, maybe not that helpful. But, some people, as their starting position, say the Bible is true. It's not a conclusion, it's a starting position. And on this view, Divine authority is accepted unconditionally by Supernaturally-endowed faith.(1:29) So, someone who holds this view would say that their faith enables them to unconditionally accept that the Bible is true. That they don't need evidence. And if we try to reason with people, we're putting reason over God. Now that sounds really compelling. No one wants to put something over God, right? Well here's the thing, such an argument, saying "if we try to reason with people, we're putting reason over God," well, that seems pretty much the same as saying, "well in order to read the Bible, you need to know language and how to read, so we're putting language and reading over God." That doesn't make much sense there.(2:04) And in order to actually understand what Scripture says, we have to use reason. You use reason all the time, when you read a statement and you realize that statement means what it says and not it's opposite. And you come to understand how two different statements fit together. That's using reason. So, I don't find the whole, "reason over God" argument very compelling.(2:27) Additionally, someone who presupposes the Bible is true is probably going to reject all attempts to independently verify that the Bible is true. Because sinful, rational man has no legitimate standard that we could test God, or His revelation by. (2:43) So that's the first view. A presupposing, a presuppositionalist view. And on the other end of the spectrum would be the idea that you could prove the Bible. And you could do this by historical and logical arguments. There are some notable people who have used this approach and have actually come to Christianity because of it. Josh McDowell, who wrote Evidence that Demands a Verdict. Lee Strobel, who wrote A Case for Christ, A Case for Faith, and many other Cases. Jay Warner Wallace, who was a cold-case homicide detective, who set out to prove Christianity wrong and Atheism true, and was actually converted to Christianity in the process. He wrote a book called Cold Case Christianity. Nancy Pearcey, who …

Is there credible evidence for the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth? What is the most reasonable conclusion to draw and how should we handle alternate theories?Audio

Video

TRANSCRIPTHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. (0:13) This week, we're going to talk about the Resurrection. It's the week before Easter, and while it's always a good time to talk about the Resurrection, there could be no better week. I think all too often as Christians, we think the Resurrection's something that needs to be believed on almost a blind faith. "We weren't there, we have no idea what happened. We just believe it because the BIble said it." But I think there are actually good reasons to believe that the Resurrection took place. And some of those come from Scripture and some of those just involve taking a well-reasoned approach. Looking at all of the evidence and saying, "what's the most reasonable conclusion here?" And so that's what we're going to do today, we're going to look at the evidence and we're going to see where it takes us. (0:55) Our first stop is the empty tomb. The tomb must have been empty when the disciples started preaching. People believe they saw Jesus in the very city where He was killed, and so what can account for them putting their trust and being willing to die for Christ if they had not actually seen Him and the tomb wasn't empty? If the tomb hadn't been empty, the body would've just been produced. The easiest way to say, "No, Jesus is actually dead", is to roll back the stone and say, "Look, there He is, you can see Him. You can smell Him. He's still in the tomb." But that is not what happened. (1:33) We actually have early and independent sources that testify to the tomb being empty. There's Mark writing pre-70 AD. Paul writes about what he learned in 36 AD when he visits Rome. John writes independently and has unique details, as do Matthew and Luke. (1:50) One of the earliest and best attested facts about Jesus is that His tomb was empty. This is what John A. T. Robinson of Cambridge University says: "Mark's account is simple and understated. It's not embellished. It's not what you would expect if someone were making up the claims about the Resurrection."(2:09) Now we actually have some made-up accounts that we are totally sure are fictitious. And one of them would be the gospel of Peter. And Mark reads nothing like that. Mark is simple and understated, no high, divine titles or Christology (ideas about Christ). Now don't misunderstand, Mark thinks of Christ as God, but it stands in stark contrast to something like the gospel of Peter, which has Jesus walking out of the tomb, heralded by a talking cross, angels, and all of this is witnessed by the Romans and the Jews. Any detail you could possibly want is in the gospel of Peter. But it's made up. Mark, on the other hand, doesn't seem like he has an agenda in that regard. He's just simply reporting the facts. (2:56) And Mark includes women at the tomb. And this makes no sense if you're making up a story because women occupied a low social position. In fact, one of the daily prayers of a Jewish man was, "Blessed are You, Lord our God, ruler of the universe, who has not created me a Gentile, a slave, or a woman." This was the prevailing cultural view. Now, this was not God's view, this is a distortion of what the Bible has taught from the very beginning. Because both man and woman are created in the image of God. But nonetheless, this was the view of the day, that women and their testimony were unreliable and not valuable. So you're not going to make up women finding the tomb empty unless it actually happened. (3:38) And this is an example of the Principle of Embarrassment. This is a principle…

Is there credible evidence for the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth? What is the most reasonable conclusion to draw and how should we handle alternate theories?Audio

Video

TRANSCRIPTHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. (0:13) This week, we're going to talk about the Resurrection. It's the week before Easter, and while it's always a good time to talk about the Resurrection, there could be no better week. I think all too often as Christians, we think the Resurrection's something that needs to be believed on almost a blind faith. "We weren't there, we have no idea what happened. We just believe it because the BIble said it." But I think there are actually good reasons to believe that the Resurrection took place. And some of those come from Scripture and some of those just involve taking a well-reasoned approach. Looking at all of the evidence and saying, "what's the most reasonable conclusion here?" And so that's what we're going to do today, we're going to look at the evidence and we're going to see where it takes us. (0:55) Our first stop is the empty tomb. The tomb must have been empty when the disciples started preaching. People believe they saw Jesus in the very city where He was killed, and so what can account for them putting their trust and being willing to die for Christ if they had not actually seen Him and the tomb wasn't empty? If the tomb hadn't been empty, the body would've just been produced. The easiest way to say, "No, Jesus is actually dead", is to roll back the stone and say, "Look, there He is, you can see Him. You can smell Him. He's still in the tomb." But that is not what happened. (1:33) We actually have early and independent sources that testify to the tomb being empty. There's Mark writing pre-70 AD. Paul writes about what he learned in 36 AD when he visits Rome. John writes independently and has unique details, as do Matthew and Luke. (1:50) One of the earliest and best attested facts about Jesus is that His tomb was empty. This is what John A. T. Robinson of Cambridge University says: "Mark's account is simple and understated. It's not embellished. It's not what you would expect if someone were making up the claims about the Resurrection."(2:09) Now we actually have some made-up accounts that we are totally sure are fictitious. And one of them would be the gospel of Peter. And Mark reads nothing like that. Mark is simple and understated, no high, divine titles or Christology (ideas about Christ). Now don't misunderstand, Mark thinks of Christ as God, but it stands in stark contrast to something like the gospel of Peter, which has Jesus walking out of the tomb, heralded by a talking cross, angels, and all of this is witnessed by the Romans and the Jews. Any detail you could possibly want is in the gospel of Peter. But it's made up. Mark, on the other hand, doesn't seem like he has an agenda in that regard. He's just simply reporting the facts. (2:56) And Mark includes women at the tomb. And this makes no sense if you're making up a story because women occupied a low social position. In fact, one of the daily prayers of a Jewish man was, "Blessed are You, Lord our God, ruler of the universe, who has not created me a Gentile, a slave, or a woman." This was the prevailing cultural view. Now, this was not God's view, this is a distortion of what the Bible has taught from the very beginning. Because both man and woman are created in the image of God. But nonetheless, this was the view of the day, that women and their testimony were unreliable and not valuable. So you're not going to make up women finding the tomb empty unless it actually happened. (3:38) And this is an example of the Principle of Embarrassment. This is a principle…

Is there truth in the world or only in us? Is science the only source of truth? What are the consequences of a view where individuals determine what's true about murder, rape, and more?Audio

Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. In subsequent weeks, we're about to embark on a journey of looking at the truthfulness of the Bible; how can we establish its truthfulness and how can we defend it. But before we do that, we need to actually talk about...truth!(0:25) Truth is so foundational and it's something that most of us just take for granted. However, in order for the Bible to be true, truth has to exist and it has to be knowable. In order for morality to exist and be something that we can actually say, "it's wrong to murder, it's wrong to rape," well truth has to exist. It has to be true, it has to reflect reality when we make those claims, in order for them to have any meaning at all. So that's why we're going to talk about truth today.(0:52) Now, there are two views of truth. The first is one of subjective truth. You'll notice that the main part of the word subjective is subject, and this is actually a claim about a person, a subject. And it expresses something that's only true for that person. A great example of a subjective truth claim would be the best flavor of ice-cream. So, you could ask someone, "what is the best flavor of ice-cream", and they would hopefully tell you chocolate moose tracks from Publix: that's the best flavor of ice-cream. That's my favorite and best flavor, I'll say that. Now here's the thing: it sounds like the person is talking about the ice-cream when they say it's the best. However, they're actually talking about themselves. They're talking about their opinions, their feelings, their preferences.(1:42) Now, that's all fine and good when you're talking about ice-cream, but some people have this same view of truth, that it's subjective, it's just about me and what I think, when it comes to issues of morality or religion. And I hope you can see just right off the bat, that's a dangerous position to be in. Because on a subjective view of truth, every individual decides what's right and wrong for themselves. And this leads to something called relativism.(2:09) So the main part of the word subjective is subject, it's about a person, a subject; the main part of the word relativism is relative. And relativism is the view that all truth claims are relative to the person making them. So when someone would say, "rape is wrong", on a subjective view of truth, it sounds like they're talking about the rape in the same way it sounded like I was talking about the ice-cream earlier. However, they're not really talking about the rape, they're talking about their feelings about the rape. "I feel that rape is wrong." But the rape itself is not actually wrong on this veiw. (2:47) Now, that's a quick summary of subjective truth. Now on the other side, we have objective truth. And this would be truth that corresponds with reality. It's truth, you could say, that's matched with its object. Subjective truth was about a subjective person; objective truth is about an object. And objective truth is true for all people, in all places, at all times, to whom the claim applies.(3:13) So here's an example of an objective truth claim. Gravity pulls objects together. That has nothing to do with my feelings, my preferences, or any of that. It's a statement about reality. Another example would be, I am male. It doesn't matter if someone else doesn't think I'm male,…

Is there truth in the world or only in us? Is science the only source of truth? What are the consequences of a view where individuals determine what's true about murder, rape, and more?Audio

Video

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello, and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. In subsequent weeks, we're about to embark on a journey of looking at the truthfulness of the Bible; how can we establish its truthfulness and how can we defend it. But before we do that, we need to actually talk about...truth!(0:25) Truth is so foundational and it's something that most of us just take for granted. However, in order for the Bible to be true, truth has to exist and it has to be knowable. In order for morality to exist and be something that we can actually say, "it's wrong to murder, it's wrong to rape," well truth has to exist. It has to be true, it has to reflect reality when we make those claims, in order for them to have any meaning at all. So that's why we're going to talk about truth today.(0:52) Now, there are two views of truth. The first is one of subjective truth. You'll notice that the main part of the word subjective is subject, and this is actually a claim about a person, a subject. And it expresses something that's only true for that person. A great example of a subjective truth claim would be the best flavor of ice-cream. So, you could ask someone, "what is the best flavor of ice-cream", and they would hopefully tell you chocolate moose tracks from Publix: that's the best flavor of ice-cream. That's my favorite and best flavor, I'll say that. Now here's the thing: it sounds like the person is talking about the ice-cream when they say it's the best. However, they're actually talking about themselves. They're talking about their opinions, their feelings, their preferences.(1:42) Now, that's all fine and good when you're talking about ice-cream, but some people have this same view of truth, that it's subjective, it's just about me and what I think, when it comes to issues of morality or religion. And I hope you can see just right off the bat, that's a dangerous position to be in. Because on a subjective view of truth, every individual decides what's right and wrong for themselves. And this leads to something called relativism.(2:09) So the main part of the word subjective is subject, it's about a person, a subject; the main part of the word relativism is relative. And relativism is the view that all truth claims are relative to the person making them. So when someone would say, "rape is wrong", on a subjective view of truth, it sounds like they're talking about the rape in the same way it sounded like I was talking about the ice-cream earlier. However, they're not really talking about the rape, they're talking about their feelings about the rape. "I feel that rape is wrong." But the rape itself is not actually wrong on this veiw. (2:47) Now, that's a quick summary of subjective truth. Now on the other side, we have objective truth. And this would be truth that corresponds with reality. It's truth, you could say, that's matched with its object. Subjective truth was about a subjective person; objective truth is about an object. And objective truth is true for all people, in all places, at all times, to whom the claim applies.(3:13) So here's an example of an objective truth claim. Gravity pulls objects together. That has nothing to do with my feelings, my preferences, or any of that. It's a statement about reality. Another example would be, I am male. It doesn't matter if someone else doesn't think I'm male,…

What does faith mean from a Biblical perspective? Do we use the word today like it was used back then? Is biblical faith blind or a leap? Is it believing in-spite of evidence?

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Don't use iTunes? Subscribe here.TranscriptHello and welcome to Unapologetic, a podcast about defending, not apologizing for, our Christian convictions. My name's Brian and today we're going to answer some important questions; for instance, what is faith? Is it a way of knowing something? Is it what we do when we don't know something? Is it a way of acting? We're going to tackle these questions today on Unapologetic. (0:24) So, faith. We've got two different usages of the word. The first would be a collection of beliefs. So, for instance, Christianity is a faith, Islam is a faith. Hinduism, I guess you could call a faith (it's a little different in that regard). It's just a collection of beliefs, so that way you could say, "a people of my faith; a people of my collection of beliefs." (0:48) But there's another usage of the word and it's, "I have faith that such and such is going to happen." "Can you prove that God exists?" "No, but I have faith"' And so faith really seems to have taken on this idea of something you do when you don't know something. And in fact, sadly culture has put a couple of words in front of faith, like "leap of" faith, or "blind" faith, and it's distorted, and we've let people distort, what the Biblical usage of faith really is.(1:24) Faith doesn't have really anything to do with knowing. That's the first thing I want to tell you. Faith isn't believing in spite of something, it doesn't have to do with how you know. Faith has to do with how you act. (1:37) In Mark 2:9-11, we see "which is easier to say to the paralytic, 'your sins are forgiven'? Or to say, 'stand up, take your stretcher and walk'? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, He said to the paralytic, 'I tell you, stand up, take your stretcher, and go home.'" What did Jesus say here? "So that you may know." Not "have faith" but faith would flow from what he knew. So many times in the New Testament, we see knowledge being talked about when coming to faith in Christ is being talked about. (2:14) Here's another example. Peter makes a case and then says, "'Therefore, let all the house of Israel know beyond a doubt that God has made this Jesus, who you crucified, both Lord and Christ.' Now when they heard this, they were acutely distressed and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'What should we do then, brothers?' Peter said to them, 'Repent, and each one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.'" There's no "have faith" in that passage; what it says is, "repent". Now, this is another word that, sadly, has been watered down in Christianity. But repent in the Bible, when it's used like that, actually means to change your mind. So, Peter makes this case and they say, "what do we do?" And he says, "change your mind"! (3:07) Now, if you change your mind, will you change direction, like is often said of the word repent? Yes. Will you say you're sorry? You will. If you change your mind about your sin, you'll say you're sorry. However, it starts with a change of mind. What we see is that the mind, knowing, knowledge, these things are key to Christianity. They don't say, "have faith", and what they don't say is, "believe in spite of evidence." (3:35) Another example, this time with Jesus. A centurion comes up to Him and wants Him to heal his servant. And Jesus says, "OK, I'll come," and…