Hi Friends,
As you know we’ve been looking at “Hard Questions for the Christians Faith”, in our Equip Class on Sunday Mornings. If you haven’t had the chance to make it out to a class yet, I would highly recommend it. This Sunday Pastor Jeff will be leading us in looking at the question, “How could a loving God allow so much suffering?” I think you’ll find yourself strengthened in your faith as we wrestle through some of these difficult questions.
This past Sunday we discussed the question that many people in our culture are asking, “How can you say there is only one true faith?” We covered a lot of ground in our class, but where we ended up at is that one of the unique aspects of our faith is that we believe in a God who took on human flesh and stepped into history. Because of this, we can examine the historical evidence to see if Jesus really was who He said He was. I love how Peter says it in 2 Peter 1:16; he says, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses….”. Our faith rests not in stories, nor in speculative thinking of what we think God is like and what pleases Him, but in the historical person and work of Jesus.
In our class we discussed how the central truth claim on which Christianity stands or falls is that Jesus rose from the dead. If he rose from the dead, He was who He said He was; the Son of God worthy of all our worship and obedience. If he did not rise from the dead, as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:14, our “faith is in vain”; it’s all a farce. Thank God, He has provided us with substantial and compelling evidence that Jesus really did rise from the dead. I mentioned in class that I wanted to send out a list of resources that could be helpful in studying the evidence for the resurrection in more detail. There are so many good resources out there, but here are a few that I would recommend:
- Historical Evidence for the Resurrection (Article, good place to start)
- Can a Scientist Believe in the Resurrection (Article by MIT professor)
- A Doubter’s Guide to Jesus: An Introduction to the Man from Nazareth for Believers and Skeptics (Book)
- The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Very comprehensive book)
- The Case for Christ: A Journalist’s Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus (Book)
In Christ,
Pastor Matt