Does God exist? The following offers honest, straight-forward reasons to believe in God...
By Marilyn Adamson
Just once wouldn't you love for someone to simply show you the evidence for God's existence? No arm-twisting. No statements of, "You just have to believe." Well, here is an attempt to offer some of the reasons which suggest that God exists.
But first consider this. If a person opposes even the possibility of there being a God, then any evidence can be rationalised or explained away. It is like if someone refuses to believe that people have walked on the moon, then no amount of information is going to change their thinking. Photographs of astronauts walking on the moon, interviews with the astronauts, moon rocks...all the evidence would be worthless, because the person has already concluded that people cannot go to the moon.
When it comes to the possibility of God's existence, the Bible says that there are people who have seen sufficient evidence, but they have suppressed the truth about God. On the other hand, for those who want to know God if he is there, he says, "You will seek me and find me; when you seek me with all your heart, I will be found by you." Before you look at the facts surrounding God's existence, ask yourself, If God does exist, would I want to know him? Here then, are some reasons to consider...
1. Does God exist? The complexity of our planet points to a deliberate Designer who not only created our universe, but sustains it today.
2. Does God exist? The human brain's complexity shows a higher intelligence behind it.
3. Does God exist? "Chance" or "natural causes" are insufficient explanations.
4. Does God exist? To state with certainty that there is no God, a person has to ignore the passion of an enormously vast number of people who are convinced that there is a God.
5. Does God exist? We know God exists because he pursues us. He is constantly initiating and seeking for us to come to him.
6. Does God exist? Unlike any other revelation of God, Jesus Christ is the clearest, most specific picture of God pursuing us.
to be continued and elaborated on at http://everystudent.com/sg/features/isthere.html...
-------------------------------------------------
Who is Jesus? A quick summary on the life of Jesus Christ - and reasons to believe in him...
By Paul E. Little
It is impossible for us to know conclusively whether God exists and what He is like unless He takes the initiative and reveals Himself. We must know what He is like and His attitude toward us. Suppose we knew He existed, but that He was like Adolf Hitler--capricious, vicious, prejudiced, and cruel. What a horrible realisation that would be!
We must scan the horizon of history to see if there is any clue to God's revelation. There is one clear clue. In an obscure village in Palestine, almost 2,000 years ago, a Child was born in a stable. Today the entire world is still celebrating the birth of Jesus.
He lived in obscurity until He was thirty, and then began a public ministry that lasted three years. It was destined to change the course of history. He was a kindly person and we're told that "the common people heard Him gladly." And, "He taught as One who had authority, and not as their teachers of the Law" (Matthew 7:29).
It soon became apparent, however, that He was making shocking and startling statements about Himself. He began to identify Himself as far more than a remarkable teacher or prophet. He began to say clearly that He was God. ...
Jesus Christ - the Son of God?
As we face the claims of Christ, there are only four possibilities. He was either a liar, a lunatic, a legend, or the Truth. If we say He is not the Truth, we are automatically affirming one of the other three alternatives, whether we realise it or not.
(1) One possibility is that Jesus lied when He said He was God--that He knew He was not God, but deliberately deceived His hearers to lend authority to His teaching. Few, if any, seriously hold this position. Even those who deny His deity affirm that He was a great moral teacher. They fail to realise those two statements are a contradiction. Jesus could hardly be a great moral teacher if, on the most crucial point of His teaching--His identity--He was a deliberate liar.
(2) A kinder, though no less shocking possibility, is that He was sincere but self-deceived. We have a name for a person today who thinks he is God. That name is lunatic, and it certainly would apply to Christ if He were deceived on this all-important issue. But as we look at the life of Christ, we see no evidence of the abnormality and imbalance we find in a deranged person. Rather, we find the greatest composure under pressure.
(3) The third alternative is that all of the talk about His claiming to be God is a legend--that what actually happened was that His enthusiastic followers, in the third and fourth centuries, put words into His mouth He would have been shocked to hear. Were He to return, He would immediately repudiate them.
The legend theory has been significantly refuted by many discoveries of modern archaeology. These have conclusively shown that the four biographies of Christ were written within the lifetime of contemporaries of Christ. Some time ago Dr. William F. Albright, world-famous archaeologist now retired from Johns Hopkins University, said that there was no reason to believe that any of the Gospels were written later than A.D. 70. For a mere legend about Christ, in the form of the Gospel, to have gained the circulation and to have had the impact it had, without one shred of basis in fact, is incredible.
For this to have happened would be as fantastic as for someone in our own time to write a biography of the late John F. Kennedy and in it say he claimed to be God, to forgive people's sins, and to have risen from the dead. Such a story is so wild it would never get off the ground because there are still too many people around who knew Kennedy. The legend theory does not hold water in the light of the early date of the Gospel manuscripts.
(4) The only other alternative is that Jesus spoke the truth. From one point of view, however, claims don't mean much. Talk is cheap. Anyone can make claims. ...
Evidence from the Life of Jesus
First, His moral character coincided with His claims.
Second, Christ demonstrated a power over natural forces which could belong only to God, the Maker of these forces.
Third, Jesus demonstrated the Creator's power over sickness and disease.
Fourth, Jesus' supreme credential to authenticate His claim to deity was His resurrection from the dead.
Was Jesus' Resurrection Just a Story?
find out more at http://everystudent.com/sg/features/faith.html...
--------------------------------------------
More questions and answers.
Why is there so much suffering?
If God is good why does he allow so much suffering?
Why
Why do people get cancer? Why is there tragedy and death?
Is God a Good Director?
Is God directing this world very well? Questions to consider...
What Will Heaven Be Like?
Is it all just strumming harps and sitting on clouds?
Reincarnation, Karma & Life after Death
The problems of reincarnation and the law of karma.
Life after Death
How good do you have to be to get to heaven?
Why do I need God to be happy?
"I have found happiness in my life. Why do I need to derive a sense of purpose and happiness from the concept of a 'divine being'?"
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Days Of Our Pink Lives (4)
So, Evan's legs dropped off and all she could do was just lie on the floor, groaning. Blood began to pool at her amputated legs. And Horsey Ma, well, he's actually secretly evil, and he knew exactly what was going to happen because he planned it! He stripped off his Jon Ma mask, purchased from NTUC at $1.99 to reveal himself as................. Evil Sean and Warren!
Sean and Warren were conjoined twins. And they squeezed themselves into the magic Horsey Ma mask to scare people. The mask was magical too, because it could turn two conjoined people into one. Actually, Sean and Warren weren't conjoined at birth, they went to a hospital to get their hips joined. So, S&W began walking around the palace, giggling to themselves about the evil deed they had just done to Evan.
Evan on the other hand was lying on the floor, moaning in pain, but yet still thinking of those fairies drowned in iodine. She began to drag herself along the floor by her arms, still looking for the BIMBO Queen Angeline. As she dragged she left trails of blood, and as S&W were wandering around they saw it, and they were shocked. "Oh, no! Queen Angeline's going to kill us because the palace isn't clean!" So they decided to clean it up. However, both S&W had different minds, and they both believed that the mop was kept somewhere else. They began to fight, trying to pull each other in different directions, until, finally, their hip surgery gave way and they split up. So they both got different mops, mopped up the blood, and Warren was walking back to return the mops when he saw poor Evan, still desperately dragging herself along the floor in search for the Queen.
"Must.... find... Queen.... fairies... iodine...!" Warren heard Evan grunt. Warren's heart began to melt at the sight of this poor girl with no legs and a kind heart, and he decided to help her. As he approached her, however, her death rattle began to shake. Evan was vibrating and trembling tremendously, and she screamed at him to rescue the fairies because she was going.
Then she went.
Warren sat there, a little stunned at what happened, then he shrugged his shoulders and said, "Okie-dokie!" So he began to search for Queen Angeline. He found her later, buffing her nails. He was thinking of how to approach her to ask for the elixir, but was afraid of her. So he sat there for 2 hours, thinking, and all that while Queen Angeline was STILL buffing her nails.
Finally he entered the room, but as he stood behind Queen Angeline, who was seated in front of a mirror, still buffing her nails, she looked up, saw him and began to scream. Warren was puzzled and wondered why, but as he saw himself in the mirror, he realized why. It was because his mind had psychoed him to believe that he was Warren, part of a artificially created conjoined twin, but he was actually Tanya! Queen Angeline's evil nemesis.
Angeline hurriedly grabbed a rainbow potion on the dresser and threw it at Warren, who began to morph into Tanya. Within seconds, he was a girl, dressed in a cute pink skirt with long hair and red nails. When he spoke, his voice was high and feminine, and in every sentence there were at least 3 "like" and he couldn't think properly. Then his brain was taken over by it's real persona, Tanya Tan Shi Rui.
Tanya flipped her hair at Angeline, screeching, "Aren't you like, glad to like, see me? Finally! I can like, get out of that hairy body, and like, be a girl again!" Angeline was temporarily stunned, but recovered. She flipped her hair back at Tanya, and it is now that we discover why she was so feared by everyone. "Like Tanya like my like darling, like isn't like it obvious like why like I like am like not like happy like to like see like you? Like, I like hate like you!"
They continued in this strain for the next few days, flipping their hair, comparing nails, who had longer eyelashes, who had the shortest leg hair, how many combs each owned etc. Finally, the wizard who was stationed outside the castle had enough of the screeches and shrieks over comparisons that he entered the castle. This wizard, of course was Benjamin. Benjamin, was actually the secret bimbo King, and he was unhappy that people were claiming to be real bimboes, but none could actually be compared to him. Benjamin entered, stood between Angeline and Tanya and flashed HIS nails at them. He flipped his hair. He plucked out his eyelash. Smoothed his hairless legs at them.
Tanya and Angeline, stunned at such perfection gasped, and both realized that they couldn't be compared to Benjamin, Bimbo King, and fled, into the Far Desert where the hurricane was gathering strength. Benjamin sighed in satisfaction as he settled himself in the golden throne. He fell asleep, snoring gently, but yet able to maintain his perfect locks which complemented his eyelashes.
He was rudely awoken by urgent knocks on the palace door. He took out his magic wand, and swished it at the doors which magically flew open, and Amanda, tore in. In her hands was a long stick, which Benjamin realized upon closer inspection was actually a living thing. Amanda threw the stick on the floor and shouted at Benjamin. "You stupid wizard! I don't care if this boy scares away all the pigeons in the world! He won't stop jumping on the pigeon shit! I have no idea what's the matter with him, but you GOT to take him back!"
The stick, which was lying on the floor got up and glared at Amanda, its eyes being barely discernible. "You can't expect me to sit there in the sun daily with pigeons crapping all over me! Did you know that pigeos crap every 15 minutes???? At least let me have some fun," Samuel yelled at Amanda.
Fact: Pigeon shit is like liquid paper. When you squeeze a lot on the paper, the top hardens first, but the bottom is still liquid. When you exert enough pressure on the hardened top, the liquid bottom still can shoot out. A bit like basaltic lava.
Amanda pointed at Benjamin and told him to turn Samuel into a pigeon, and Benjamin was still blurry eyed from his nap, so he just pointed his wand at Samuel and muttered a few words. Samuel was then blown away by a strong, strong wind which took him so far away he was just like a little underfed, malnourished pigeon in the sky.
Amanda shrieked at Benjamin," I asked for a pigeon, not blow him away."
"Sorry." Benjamin waved his wand, and then Amanda turned into a pigon in a midst of bright sparkles. Amanda gasped, and began to complain, but because she was no longer human, she could only squawk and Benjamin was tired, and wanted to sleep so he waved his wand and Amanda flew up into the air with the same wind that blew Samuel away. Amanda squawked all the way, and because she was a pigeon but hated pigeons, she began beating and slapping herself because she was a pigeon and she hated herself.
After the wind blew Amanda far far away, she tried to kill herself, by jumping off an extremely tall building, but forgetting she had wings, every time she threw herself off she just soared into the sky, then tried again. So she tried again and tried again and tried again. Finally a jet plane flew by and she smashed into the pilot's window, blinding him and knocking him off his seat.
An impact as much as this basically killed her lah, and her dying squawks were observed by the airplane's passengers.
So to summarise what happened so far, the fairies are still drowning in iodine, and Sean's still wondering around in the palace.
Sean got lost trying to find the closet to return his mop, but as he opened one particular door, hoping that that was it, he was blinded by the sight of lots and lots of glittery bottles of panadol! Sean was blinded, so he basically knocked into every bottle, smashed it, inhaled the panadol, fell on the floor atop the smashed glass pieces and overdosed on panadol. You should know that his death rattle began to shake and blah blah blah.
To the less smart ones, Sean died.
Meanwhile, Kim who was actually still in the land of Pink Frosting overheard the Christian passerby saying that if you travelled in a jet plane, and got high enough, you could spot a magical banjo player on the purple clouds, and if you could persuade him to come down and play his special banjo music to the fairies, they could live again! So Kimberly, in high hopes had boarded a jet plane, which is the exact same plane that Amanda the pigeon crashed into and hit the pilot of.
On the jet plane.....
The pilot began to scream as he realized his eyeball was hanging out of his face, and he quickly grabbed the nearest thing, which was a hamster. The hamster squeaked like mad and began to transform into a fairy god mother.
In my twisted imagination, a fairy god mother is like a squeeze toy, you got to squeeze it to make it work. Or press it's bracelet that says, "Press me" then it would start dancing, singing, turning into a fairy godmother etc.
So this fairy godmother escaped the body of its skin, revealing herself to be Melissa! Melissa looked at the pilot who was still holding the hamster suit and grappling around on the floor for his eyeball and took pity on him. She waved her wand and in a rush of glitter, the pilot got his eyeball back, but at the same time got a magic tiara and glass slippers.
This pilot was Melvin, who screamed when he saw his glass slippers. "They're not ADIDAS!" He yelled at Melissa, who rolled her eyes, waved a wand, and gave him an extra leg because of his ingratitude. On this third leg, he was wearing an Adidas glass slipper.
Kimberly, on the plane spied some musical notes flying on top of a cumulomnimbus cloud and ran to the pilot's cockpit, where Melvin was still standing there on his three legs admiring his third leg and it's Adidas slipper. She took the throttle and flew the plane towards the cloud, and crash landed it there.
She got off the plane, followed the sounds of the banjo playing, and turned around a corner to find Shaun kia! Shaun was sitting there strumming his magical banjo and Kimberly gasped. Finally! A glimmer of hope for the iodine-drowned fairies!
On the other side of the cloud, the passengers got off the plane, and some, upon realizing that they could never get off the cloud because Kim crash landed it, began to weep miserably. But the wind that blew Samuel the stick happened to go there, and Samuel landed on the cloud. The strains of the banjo reached him, and the tears of the sad passengers dripped onto Samuel. The banjo music and the salt in their tears turned Samuel into a magical carpet, like an imaginary rolling pin kneading some dough. All the passengers' hopes were restored and they hopped onto Samuel, leaving behind Melvin, who was STILL looking at his Adidas slipper and Kimberly was gazing in wonderment at the magical banjo player.
What happens next? Could Melvin lose his glass slipper? Or Kimberly manage to persuade the banjo player to save the iodine-drowned fairies? Find out in the next episode of Days of our Pink Lives!
Cheryl at 3:49 pm
God is perfect, we are sinful, so there is a great gap between us. We may try to feel better through work, relationships, sport or religion. But all our attempts fail, because we have ignored the real problem - turning our back on God.
Jesus took the consequences of our self-centredness by giving up his life on the cross. He proved he had broken sin's destructive power by rising from the dead. Jesus offers us freedom from guilt and a bridge back to God.
