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Sermons

 

1 Peter 3:15,16

 

But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear; 16 having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed.

 

  1. Is there a beginning?

 

Genesis 1:1

 

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

 

Nothing can not create something

 

 

This is an observable fact that the galaxies are moving at a steady rate of speed from a point of origin

 

‘Energy can neither be created nor destroyed.

 

There are several problems with this statement first off it is not scientific in essence science is based on observable facts. There is not observable evidence to prove the dogmatic “can” and “can not” statements. The statement should say “As much as we have observed the amount of energy in the cosmos remains constant” this does not contradict the creation of the universe because we could say the amount of energy since the creation of the universe remains constant.

 

The second problem about an eternal universe is with the second law of thermo dynamics.

 

This law states that the universe is running out of usable energy

 

Science proves the first law of thermodynamics as I have stated it and proves the second law both are observable. Both of these theories only further the idea of a creation and thus a creator.

 

The idea of a creation is then proven scientifically sound and reasonable and if the idea of a creation is sound and reasonable then so must a Creator be sound and reasonable.

 

1800’s scientist were convinced chlamydia, the plague, and cholera were caused by “bad air”

 

Until the early 20th century science was sure the continents did not move until continental drift was proven

Until the 1980’s peptic ulcers were the result of stress

 

No current scientific model can account for the origin of life from non-life

 

 

  1. II) The Bible is God’s Word

 

– Unlike other holy books, the Bible alone has been supernaturally confirmed to be the Word of God. For only the Scriptures were written by prophets who were supernaturally confirmed by signs and wonders.

1)“When Moses questioned how his message would be accepted, God performed miracles through him “that [the Israelites] may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you” (Exodus 4:5).

 

2) Later, when Korah rose up to challenge Moses, God again miraculously intervened to vindicate his prophet (see Numbers 16)—

 

3) Elijah was confirmed to be a prophet of God by supernatural intervention on Mount Carmel (see 1 Kings 18).

 

4) In the Gospels, the Jewish teacher Nicodemus said to Jesus, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him” (John 3:2 see Luke 7:22). Peter declared, “Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him” (Acts 2:22).

 

5) The writer of Hebrews affirms that “God also testified to [salvation through Jesus Christ] by signs, wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will” (Hebrews 2:4).

 

6) And the apostle Paul proved his apostleship by affirming, “The things that mark an apostle—signs, wonders and miracles—were done among you with great perseverance” (2 Corinthians 12:12).

 

 

– No other book can claim the accurate prediction that the Bible does there are over 200 predictions hundreds of years before the birth of Christ about him, here is a sampling..

 

– of a woman Genesis 3:15.

– of the line of Abraham Genesis 12:1–3; 22:18.

– through the tribe of Judah Genesis 49:10.

– as a son of David 2 Samuel 7:12–13.

– in the city of Bethlehem Micah 5:2.

– of a virgin Isaiah 7:14.

– suffer and die for our sins Isaiah 53

– at about A.D. 33 Daniel 9:24–26

– rise from the dead Psalm 16:11 see Psalm 2:7–8.

 

  • Truth is truth

 

Jesus said in John 14:6

 

“Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

 

In our world today you will here the statement made “there is no universal truth?”

 

In itself that statement is a dichotomy because stating that, “there is no universal truth”…. is in itself a universal truth

 

 

Was Jesus a good man?

 

Statistics tell us that those that know the name well of 80% believe that He was good.

 

Did Jesus raise from the dead?

 

Then the question of truth comes to morality

 

.Do you believe? If not I have given you proof to consider today

 

 

Additional notes

 

The Five Possibilities of Who Jesus Was/Is

 

Based upon these claims of Jesus, there are only 5 logical possibilities for who Jesus, in actuality, was/is: Lunatic, Liar, Myth, Guru, or Lord.

 

  • Lunatic (Jesus was crazy)

 

  • Actually, this was a charge in Jesus own day (Mk 3:21-22), in the same way as it was for St. Paul (Acts 26:24)
    • But actual lunatics don’t refute the charge (Mk 3:23-30 for Jesus; Acts 26:25-26 for Paul)
  • Lunatics are generally not believable and/or intellectually threatening.
  • Jesus did not act like a mad man.
  • Even atheists and non-Christians believe Jesus to be a “great moral teacher”.
  • Lunatics are not moral teachers (see Hitler).
  • Jesus had the wrong psychological profile.
  • No (monotheistic, non-idolatrous) Jew could seriously think Jesus was God if He wasn’t.

 

  • Liar (Jesus (or the Apostles) made it all up)

 

  • Liars lie for personal motives/gain.  Jesus got the cross; the Apostles got martyrdom.  Nobody dies for a lie.
  • Jesus backed up His claims with visible miracles, most notably the Resurrection.
  • Lies die with the death of the liar.  Jesus’ words live on, just as He promised (Lk 21:33).
  • “Great moral teachers” are not liars.
  • “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell.  You must make your choice.  Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.  You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.  But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher.  He has not left that open to us.  He did not intend to.” (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity 55-56).

 

  • Myth (Jesus never actually existed; He was made up by the Apostles)

 

  • By far the most popularly accepted answer to the question of who Jesus is by secularists today.
  • Jesus as a historical figure has far more support from ancient texts than any other figure from antiquity.
    • Not only in the Gospels, but extra-biblical writings from Tacitus, Suetonius, Josephus.
    • “Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ, and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians so named from him are not extinct at this day.” (Josephus, Jewish Antiquities3.3, c. 90 AD)
  • No motive for the Apostles to perpetuate the myth: they were tortured and martyred.
  • Not enough time for a myth to develop.  There were eyewitnesses.
  • The Apostles portrayed themselves as idiots.  Not the best tactic for gaining adherents. (See the Gospel of Mark.)
  • No one in the history of Christianity has ever said that they made up the Jesus story.
  • The Gospels are not written in the same literary genre as other myths.  Did the Apostles invent “historical fiction”?
  • Many people witnessed Jesus’ preaching and deeds.  The Apostles could not get away with perpetuating a myth if there were eyewitnesses to contradict them.
  • The St. Paul problem.  Something dramatic happened to St. Paul to make him the best Christian evangelist ever and to lose his life for the faith.  The easiest/most logical explanation is that he had an encounter with the risen Christ.
  • The existence of the Church problem.  There are no made-up founders of religions.

 

  • Guru (Jesus was actually a guru, having incorporated the pantheism of eastern religions into His teachings)

 

  • Jesus was as Jewish as they come. (Mt 5:17-20)
  • Jesus did not promote the “losing of the self” but rather that “those who lose their lives for my sake will save them” (Mt 16:25).  He claimed to be the center of existence.  The emptying of oneself led not to nothingness, but rather to communion with Christ.
  • There is nothing but straw-grasping to suggest that Jesus ever traveled to the east to learn eastern mysticism.  On the contrary, people who heard Jesus spoke as though they’ve known Him from youth and would have known if He had gone somewhere to study (Mk 6:1-4).
  • Lord (Jesus was/is God, exactly who He said He was/is)

 

  • If none of the other possibilities are rational/logical or fit the evidence we have, then this is what we are left with: Jesus is God.
  • Is there anything Jesus said or did that invalidates His claim?  No.
  • Still requires a “leap of faith”, but not an irrational one.

One Final Objection: Jesus as portrayed in the Gospels is not the actual “historical Jesus”

 

  • That the “real” Jesus did not claim divinity, did not perform miracles, and basically didn’t say or do 99% of what is contained within the Gospels (Jesus Seminar).
  • But the Gospels (and Acts) are very detail-oriented, and contain many distinct features, people, places, and events that could only have been related by eyewitnesses:
    • Jesus writing in the sand (Jn 8:6)
    • Healing of the woman with the hemorrhage (Mk 5:25-34)
    • The alabaster jar (Mk 14:3-9)
    • Mary’s Magnificat (Lk 1:46-55)
    • “And His mother kept all these things in her heart” (Lk 2:19, 2:51)
    • Street called Straight (Acts 9:10-11)
    • Luke 3:1-4
    • John’s claim (Jn 21:24-25)

Peter’s claim (2 Pt 1:16-18)