Someone asked:
Why does God need people to make his arguments for him? Why can’t he just reveal his true self, clearly and unequivocally, and settle the question once and for all? If God existed, why wouldn’t it just be obvious?
In a word: faith. True biblical Christianity requires faith. There is absolutely nothing we can do to please God except to have faith and trust in Him and Him alone. All religions except biblical Christianity require you to DO something to earn whatever. We can do NOTHING to get to heaven except to have faith in what Jesus did for us on the cross. No more, no less. We are sinners not because we sin, but because we are born that way. No hope except what Jesus did. He Who had no sin, gave us who have no righteousness, innocence. It’s called grace – unmerited favor. Faith.
I’m no judge, nor do I judge you. We are all taught/learn however the information is presented. As with any organization – business, church, government – they are run by people and they’ll ruin it. They can’t help it. If you wish to put a label on me, think of it this way: I’m a road sign on the road of your life – heed it, don’t heed it. You won’t know if that sign was accurate until you get to the destination. If I say the bridge is out ahead and you ignore me you suffer the consequences. I would rather believe in God and be wrong, than to find out there is a God and not having accepted His free gift. God never wants anyone to go to hell, but our destination is completely every mans choice.
In all my writings I warn everyone to do their own homework and not take my word for it. However I find people with deep convictions suffer from cognitive dissonance, the same condition some suffer when a crisis occurs called normalcy bias and can’t understand even if they study the subject in question. Even the Scriptures point this out: “If our good news is hid, it is hid to them that are lost.” Vain philosophies explain away the truth. 1+1=2, but philosophy says 1+1=1: 1 fox + 1 chicken = 1 satisfied fox. They say, using this formula, that truth then is relative. Yet truth has no agenda. Pilot asked Jesus, “What is truth?” Communist Russia named their paper Pravda – truth – but did they reveal the truth. So let’s turn to mathematics. The Greek mathematician Pythagoras declared that numbers were the basic elements of the universe. Plato said that numbers and mathematical laws are ethereal ideals, existing outside of space and time in a realm beyond the reach of humankind. The physicist Eugene Wigner once said the failure to explain rationally the “unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics, an enormous gap in human understanding.” So how smart does one need to become to write one verse, the very first verse, of the bible into an amazing mathematical enigma? If you understand math, then you’ll see it for yourself here http://www.whatabeginning.com/Misc/Wonders/P.htm
Finally, the single most proof of God’s existence beyond the math is prophecy. Don’t confuse fortune telling with prophecy. Prophecy can only come from God and will NEVER EVER be wrong. 150 years before Israel’s captivity to Babylon, Isaiah named the leader who would let them go home – Cyrus. When he was shown this, he let them go. You could call it a manipulation of the fact, but they were only in captivity 70 years – which was also prophesied by Isaiah. They were free to leave in the 70th year of their captivity. There is no denying that Israel ceased to exist (70 AD) and its population scattered to the four winds (~135 AD). Yet even before they were scattered they were told they would be born in a day. The first nation elected into existence by the world was Israel in a U.N. vote on May 14, 1948. In the OT the shekel was used as a measure of weight, yet the bible says in the last days they would use the shekel as money. Just last month they renamed their currency to “Shekel” from “New Israeli Shekel”. The bible also says that Jerusalem would be divided and one day the west part of the city would be united to the east. From its founding to 1948 it was united, then split in the war of independence, and reunited in 1967. So you say “those are all coincidences” so here’s one yet to be fulfilled: Troubles at night and by morning Damascus will cease to be a city. Written some 3500 years ago, Damascus is one of, if not the oldest inhabited city in the world – conquered yes, but still a city. Here’s another: a temple will be built in Jerusalem without the outer court and the sacrifices will resume (having been stopped in 70AD) and run for only 1150 days and be stopped.
Here’s a mathematical impossibility: God told Israel through Moses that the 9th of Av (Jewish month) would be a continual time of mourning for them.
- The first (29 July 587 BC) and second (4 Aug 70 AD) temples were destroyed on 9 Av;
- Jerusalem was plowed under with salt on 9 Av (25 July 71 AD);
- the last resistance of Israel to the Romans was destroyed on 9 Av (5 Aug 135 AD);
- Pope Urban II began the teaching evil towards the Jews igniting the first Crusades in the month of Av throughout France;
- England expelled the Jews on 9 Av (18 July 1290 AD);
- France expelled the Jews on 10 Av (22 July 1306 AD);
- Spain expelled the Jews on 8 Av (31 July 1492);
- World War I France to Germany and Germany to Russia declared war on 9 Av (1 August 1914);
- three days earlier Russia expelled the Jews on 6 Av (29 July 1914 remember “Fiddler on the Roof”);
- the Germans began a systematic liquidation of the Ghetto on 8 Av (22 July 1942);
- In response to their treatment, a revolt occur in the Ghetto and on 9 Av (10 August 1943) the Germans “cleansed” the Ghetto – no more Jews in Warsaw…
You can ignore these facts, but you cannot deny God’s promise to a people whose calendar is only unique to them and yet the world acts wrongly towards them on that day.