There was an awkward silence for a few moments, and then Isaac spoke up. "...I’ve never had it explained that way before."
"Same." Aaron followed.
"Yeah...It's a cool story." I stated, unsure of what to say.
"Oh, but it's far more than a story," Angie said.
"Is it?" I didn't want to offend her, but she was asking for it.
"Yes, of course! Don't you think so?"
Hmm...do I
think so...? "Well, to be honest, not really."
"Why? Go ahead and say it if you want. You won't offend me."
"...well, for one thing, I don't think Jesus was even a real person. Probably a made up character or something. And another thing, I don't believe in the supernatural. I think people just make up stories like that to give themselves hope or whatever. Know what I mean?"
"Umm...I can see what you mean, but why don't you think Jesus was a real person? There's
overwhelming evidence of His existence. I mean, it's not like you can prove it scientifically, because we're not dealing with science here; we're dealing with history, so you have to use different tactics to prove if Jesus was historically real. One way to prove it is by looking at manuscripts outside of the Bible that mention Him. And Archeologists have discovered
tons of manuscripts. As a few examples, there are some of the writings of a Jewish historian named Josephus, from the first century; Tacitus, a Roman historian from the early second century; and a letter written by Pliny the Younger who was a Roman that persecuted Christians in the first century. All of them were against Christianity. They also include information that a man named Christ was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and His followers were called Christians. And I could tell you more about that, but you'll just have to check it out for yourself. Try either the internet or a book called ‘The Case for Christ’ by Lee Strobel. It's really good reading. Anyways, my point is, Jesus' existence is hardly even debated now. There's too much evidence."
"I see." I said contemplatively. "Then maybe some people just went all out to make stories from his life that never really happened"
"As in the virgin birth, the miracles He performed, and the resurrection?"
"Exactly."
"Have you done the research?" she asked pointedly.
"Not a lot."
"Well then let me fill you in if you don't mind. First of all, I should point out that the fact that you don't believe in the supernatural is a preconceived idea. So, when you approach history, you're approaching it with a closed mind and with an assumption that there is no supernatural, regardless of the facts. You're making your conclusion before you examine the evidence, and until you're willing to lay aside your preconceived ideas, you will
never believe in the miraculous events of Jesus' life. Just thought I'd point that out. But anyways, let's focus on the resurrection, since that's probably the most important thing. If there was no resurrection, Christianity is pointless, and millions of people throughout the last two thousand years have completely wasted their lives."
We listened to her intently. I'd never known Angie to be interested in this sort of thing, so it made me curious.
What got her interested? I didn't know, but she had my undivided attention.
"The resurrection of Jesus Christ," she continued after taking a breath, "was either the greatest event in all of history...or the greatest hoax. So many people have tried to debunk it and call it a fraud or a myth, but even after two thousand years, it has stood up to the hardest scrutiny. They've suggested that Jesus never existed, like you believe; they've suggested that Jesus never really died, and that He just 'passed out'; that the disciples merely stole His body from the grave; or that when they went to the tomb and found it was empty; they had gone to the wrong one; and there are more theories, I'm sure. But, all of these suggestions make absolutely no sense if you look at the evidence of the resurrection. I've already mentioned some evidence of Jesus' existence, He couldn't have just passed out, because Jesus had been tortured by Roman Soldiers who were
trained to kill people--that was their
job, and by no means would they let Him come down from that cross alive. Also, if the disciples had stolen His body, then would they really have later on died for something they knew was a lie? All of them faced harsh persecution, and most of them were killed in terrible ways. I don't think those disciples were gonna' start a religious movement based solely on something they knew for a fact was a downright lie. But, let's say they went to the wrong tomb. The Jewish authorities knew all to well where the real tomb was and they would have been more than glad to produce the body if it was still in that tomb, considering they were against Jesus all together. Oh, and I should also say that, well..I know of one religion in particular that believes Jesus only rose spiritually and not physically, but if you go with that, you have to explain away all of the profound statements in the Bible so that they won't contradict that theory. It just makes no sense. Anyways...I'm just scratching the surface on this, but there are a ton of books, internet articles, and stuff like that, that have been written on this subject if it sparks your curiosity. Just remember that if you hold to a certain belief about the resurrection, go find evidence before you stand firm. It's based on evidence, and the more you find, the more you realize how impossible the other theories really are." Her tone came out with a slightly arrogant edge to it, but the expression on her sixteen year old face, though stern, revealed no such harshness; more like firmness.
"Hmm..." I was trying to think of something else to bring up.
"Hey Angie," Jayda spoke up. "Could I get a glass of water?"
"Sure," she replied. "In fact, why don't we all take a break for a minute. I'm kind of hungry myself."
(Aaron)
We had gotten up to get a quick snack, but as we settled down in the living room again, I decided to ask a question to Angie and Jayda that had been bugging me for a little bit.
"So," I started. "You two have been telling us about your religion and everything, but lemme ask you something. What makes yours better than everyone else's? I mean, do you realize how many religions there are in this world? Why should we believe yours over all the others?"
Angie replied first. "Okay, first of all...you guys are free to believe anything you want. We're not trying to force our beliefs on you or anything, trust me. What we
are trying to do, though, is inform you. Because, think about it. If what we have told you is true, it would be so incredibly
selfish for us not to tell you. If it's true, it's the greatest truth in the entire universe and it's our job to tell as many people as we can before it's too late!"
"That's right," Jayda affirmed. "But, that's a very good question, Aaron. And to answer it, let me say this: Christianity is only as true as Christ is, so to determine whether Christianity is true, you have to look at Jesus. If you want to know why you should believe Him out of all the other religions of the world, look what sets Him apart from every other religious leader." She sipped her glass of water that she had brought from the kitchen.
That gave Angie a chance to pick up where she left off. "Can you think of any religious leader who has done any of the following: claimed to be the Son of God and God in flesh, including assuming the authority of God to be able to forgive sins and have the power over life and death; claim to be the only way to God the Father and eternal life; claim to be sinless; or, claim that he would be killed, but then rise to life three days later?" That was a rhetorical question. "Jesus did. He was the only one. Can you imagine how
crazy that is? Just try to picture this. I walk in here and tell you guys 'Hey, I'm God, I'm the only way that you can live forever, and oh by the way, I'm going to die next week, but don't worry because I'll be back in a couple days.' You'd all think I'm nuts, right?"
A grin spread across my face. "Oh yeah."
"Well, that's what Jesus did! He made those claims in front of not only His disciples, but also His enemies! He claimed those things in front of the religious leaders of the day who could've
easily had Him executed for blasphemy! What kind of sane man would say those things unless they were true?
"But of course, what if He was insane? What if He only
thought He was right when He said 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me'? If you study the four gospels, though, you can see that Jesus showed no signs of insanity. He loved people, He healed people, His answers to His challengers would often silence them, He reacted sanely to the situations around Him...it's obvious He wasn't insane. But, what if He was lying? If so, could He really be that vicious to all of humanity by claiming to be the only way to heaven, and then in doing so, knowingly send people to hell? And could He really be that foolish to claim to be God even though He knew that that would bring around His unspeakably shameful death? And at the same time--again,
if He was lying--could He really be able to speak such love to people's souls that He even has an immeasurable affect on all sorts of people two thousand years later? Many of those people come from totally different backgrounds, religions, cultures, nations, languages--and some of them had even once despised Him!
"Think about it! Can you think of any religious leader like this in history? Just take the claim to be God for example. Did Muhammad ever claim to be God? Or Buddha? Or Joseph Smith? Or any other founders of a religion? And even if they did, did they have any convincing evidence to back it up? See, that's another unique aspect of Jesus. He not only made extraordinary claims, but He also backed them up in extraordinary ways. The resurrection, obviously, is a major one, but also His miracles definitely say something--which, you should look into that part a little bit if you don't believe He did any miracles."
"There's also something else that makes Jesus so unique, and well...
convincing." Jayda cut in. "In the Old Testament, there are a countless number of passages that prophecy specific events of His life--"
"And birth, death, and resurrection." Angie interrupted.
"Yep. And Christ fulfilled every last one of them. And I know some people say that the New Testament was only written to
look like He fulfilled them, or that people went back to the Old Testament and added the prophecies after Jesus lived, but that just isn't true. There's evidence that the four gospels were written around, or even
before AD seventy, within the life spans of some of the eyewitnesses of Jesus' life. So, if they were wrong, any opponent of Christianity could make sure to tell people. Also, for those who would like to believe that the prophecies were added into the Old Testament later, they'll have to explain why we now have copies of every single book of the OT, except Esther, dating back to before Christ, and some dating back to even a
thousand years before Christ. It's called the Dead Sea Scrolls;
very intriguing.
"Anyways, so there's no doubt that these prophecies are authentic, but many are also specific. This is something else that sets Jesus apart from all other religious leaders. He fulfilled a whole bunch of prophecies which can't be ignored.”
"I've heard of other prophecies throughout the Bible, too." Isaac asserted, slightly randomly.
"Yep, there are hundreds," Angie confirmed. "That's something that makes the Bible so unique, too."
“Yeah, that's another thing I was wondering about. What about the Bible? Why should we believe it?" I questioned.
"Well..." Jayda's turn this time. "It's simple: prophecy, archeology, and science."
Jared leaned forward when she said this. "Could you clarify?"
She grinned. "Of course. Let's start with prophecy. Off the top of my head, I can think of about three passages that prophecy something in recent history." She reached inside her purse which leaned against her chair, and pulled out a small, torn up Bible, covered with a few strips of duct tape--apparently she used it a lot. She set it on her lap and began to flip through the pages, then stopped. "Let's see...here it is. Ezekiel twenty-nine, fifteen...it's God speaking to the prophet Ezekiel, talking about Egypt. 'It shall be the most lowly of kingdoms, and never again exalt itself above the nations. And I will make them so small that they will never again rule over the nations.' Okay, so you gotta' understand the history here. This was written in five hundred BC. Until Ezekiel's time, Egypt was a world power--it had been for
centuries. It had taken control over other nations, but around this time, it was apparently attacked or something. This passage is plainly stating that Egypt would never again rule over another nation. For the last about two thousand five hundred years, this is exactly what we see! Instead of dominating other nations, it has been dominated by the Romans, Ottomans, and Europeans, and even though now it's an independent nation, it's still not a huge power. In nineteen forty-eight, sixty-seven, and I think seventy-three, Egypt tried to conquer Israel, and even though it has succeeded before, and it's like ten times larger than Israel, it failed. Ezekiel had no way of knowing the future unless God told him."
She was silent as she flipped through some more pages. "Isaiah forty-three, five and six. This is God speaking to Israel, His people; 'Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, 'Give them up!' and to the south, 'Do not hold them back.' Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth...'
"Around this time, the Jews in the northern Israeli kingdom had been forced to other areas in the Middle East by the Assyrians. That was about two thousand seven hundred years ago. Then about nineteen hundred years ago, in AD seventy, the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and as a result, the remaining Jews who had not been killed had to move to other parts of the world.
"Until recently--as in the last century--the Jews have been dispersed all over the world. But, ever since the last century, the Jews have gradually been going back to Israel, and the prophet Isaiah goes in detail about this. He says that they'll be coming from the east, the west, the north, and the south.
"This is true, because Jews from the Middle East began moving back to Israel in the nineteen hundreds, and then from the west, thousands of Jews from the U.S and Europe moved back to Israel in the mid nineteen hundreds. From the north, Jews from the former Soviet Union were finally allowed to move back to Israel in the nineteen eighties, because at first, Russia refused to let them leave, but after being pressured by other nations, they gave in. Lastly, from the south, Ethiopia also refused to let up its Jews, but when Israel made a deal with Ethiopia, they finally allowed their Jews to move back, so on May twenty-fifth, nineteen ninety-one, fourteen thousand five hundred Jews were airlifted to Israel.”
"
Holy hell, do you have that
memorized or something!?" I exclaimed.
"Nah, I wrote it down," she chuckled as she held up the piece of paper that I didn't notice before. "Anyways...Isaiah's prophecy gets even
more specific when you look at the verse again and see what he said about the north and south. 'I will say to the north, `Give them up!` and to the south, `Do not hold them back.`'
"Russia and Ethiopia both had to be persuaded before they would allow their Jews to leave. Oh, also...Isaiah was right when he said 'Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth', too. There were Jews that came from 'as far east as China, as far west as the West coast of the US, as far north as Scandinavia, and as far south as South Africa.' And by the way, I quoted that from a site I found. Anyways, that was all written like two thousand seven hundred years ago!
"So, one more prophecy." She turned a couple pages. "Isaiah sixty-six, seven through nine; 'Before she was in labor she gave birth; before her pain came upon her she delivered a son. Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Shall a land be born in one day? Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment? For as soon as Zion was in labor she brought forth her children.'
"This text metaphorically describes the 'rebirth' of Israel which happened on May fourteenth, nineteen forty-eight. Prior to nineteen forty-eight, Israel was not an independent nation, but on this day, May fourteenth, the US declared Israel to be sovereign, and only a few hours before this, a UN mandate expired, which ended Britain's control over Israel. Israel really
did become an independent nation within only twenty four hours!
"Oh, and the verse says that the pain will come after the birth. This is exactly what happened, because only a few hours after Israel declared itself to be independent, a multitude of nations attacked it--Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. Isn't that pretty insane? And something else to consider is that usually independence is a
result of a war; the 'birth pains' happens before the 'birth' of a nation. But, in this case, the independence was the
cause of the war...so the 'birth pains' happened
after the 'birth'. That's how the metaphor describes the rebirth of Israel. Pretty crazy, huh?"
"Yeah," Jared muttered, followed by a 'wow' from Isaac and me each.
"So, let's move on to archeology." Jayda continued. "Archeology may not directly prove that the Bible is the Word of God, but it certainly supports its accuracy, because the more discoveries you find that the Bible doesn't contradict, the more credibility it gets. And, yes, they
do find more and more discoveries that goes right along with the Bible. Sometimes, there might be a discovery that seems to prove something in the Bible to be wrong, but the problem is always with the archeologist--either a misinterpretation of the findings, or the Bible, or whatever. And I won't give you any specific examples of any discovers, because I want you to research it yourself and see, but let me just give you this: both the Smithsonian Institute and National Geographic Society consider the Bible to be of value when dealing with archeology and history...and neither of them are Christian oriented. So, that's really saying something. Out of all the religious books of the world, why would two professional organizations consider the Bible a valuable tool? Maybe because it is. They're not Christian, they're not Jewish, and they're not stupid. Yet, they still use it. That'll give you a starting base."
"Hold on..." Jared interrupted. "We don't have time to look this stuff up! We're gonna' be moving out soon and it's going to get
really busy after that."
She chuckled. "All you do is take about an hour and go on a search engine, and type in 'Bible and archeology' or something like that. Even fifteen minutes or a half hour if you'd like. It's not that time consuming. And you might as well do it now before your life gets even more hectic. Anyways, may I continue or have you gotten bored?"
"Yeah...go on."
"Okay...well, on to science, then. The Bible is not a science book. But, when it assumes a scientific fact in a passage, it's right all the time. As one example, the book of Leviticus states that 'the life of the flesh is in the blood'. And yet, only a couple hundred years ago, if someone got sick, it was the norm to take out their blood. And yet, the Bible clearly states that if you lose your blood, you'll lose your life. And that was written thousands of years ago.
"Another example; I believe it's in the book of Romans--which was written like two thousand years ago--that there's a verse that says 'the things which are seen were not made of things which do appear', when speaking of the creation of the earth. Didn't we discover not too long ago that everything is made of microscopic things called atoms? There's a pile of other examples, but I think that if you searched 'scientific facts in the Bible' on a search engine, you'll find that modern man is only
just catching up to the Bible in the realm of science. No joke."
Jared laughed at that. "Yeah right. Maybe
some stuff is accurate about, but not all of it. The creation and flood account in Genesis is far from science. And that's something I
have researched."
"Jared," Angie said. "Do you believe in Evolution?"
"Yep. And I don't mean to offend anyone, but I don't get how anyone could honestly believe something different. It seems
so obvious to me."
"Hmm...why do you believe it?"
"Many reasons. I'm not one to ignorantly believe it; I have evidence. DNA, vestigial structures, the fossil record--all sorts of evidence."
"Alright," Jayda said. "If you're up for it, give me the best you have."
A smirk seemed to form across his face. "Oh, where to start...vestigial structures," He threw out in a challenging tone. "I've thought of plenty of them. The appendix, the tail bone, the little tiny useless hairs on humans, Goosebumps...the list goes on. There are structures in life--not only that humans possess--that we don't need anymore. That's evidence that we evolved from other life forms that
did need them, but lost their functions as the DNA was carried over to humans. And if god created us, even if he used evolution to create us, why would he give us useless features unless he was stupid, cruel, or not all-powerful?"
"...do you want us to try to refute your evidence, or give you the short answer?" Angie asked.
"Hmmm...both."
"Kay," she began in a casual tone. "Well, with the appendix thing...they actually
do have a significant function. The appendix plays an important role in the development of embryos and also in the immune system. Without it, you're a lot more likely to get sick. So yeah, you could say it just adapted, but it depends on how you look at it. The evolutionist says it's an organ that lost its function when we inherited it from lower life forms, but the creationist says it's a totally separate organ, and just because Charles Darwin compared it with the organ in other animals that appears to be the same thing only more useful, doesn't make that true. Besides, most animals don't even have one! Some rodents do, apes do, monkeys don't, and of course humans do. So, even if you were to call it an organ that we inherited from the apes, there's a huge gap in the 'tree' of life, since most animals don't have one." She paused as if she were done.
Then Jayda took over. "The tailbone isn't vestigial either. It has some very important muscles connected to it that you can look up on your own if you want. And as for the seemingly useless, tiny human hairs, they do
too have a use. They enhance your sense of touch. But, just because the use might not be vital to live, doesn't mean it's useless."
"Yep," Angie continued. "Oh and Goosebumps actually have a use too. All it is, is a muscle contraction that causes oil to go on the surface of your skin and then works as an insulator because the oil traps air around the skin. See? And there's a truck load of other 'vestigial structures', but all have a use. Can I just tell you my view on the Creation- Evolution controversy, though?"
"...Have at it." Jared replied in a cautious sounding voice.
"Well, the past couple of years, being cooped up in the house so much, I've had a
lot of time to do research on things like evolution versus creation and I've come to the conclusion that both of them are worldviews. Neither of them are science--not even Evolution. By the way, when I say Evolution, I mean
macro-evolution. Anyways, the reason I say that is because an Evolutionist and a Creationist can look at the same exact thing and come to two separate conclusions. You can't say the facts speak for themselves, because you have to have an interpreter for even the obvious facts. And, depending on what your worldview is--whether it be Creation or Evolution--you're sure to come to two different conclusions. Because I mean, Creation and Evolution are both based off much of the same evidence. Both Evolution and the biblical account of Creation and the flood use fossils, homologous structures, DNA, and many more things to support themselves. I just happen to believe in Creation because I think that theory fits the evidence more snuggly."
"I see." Jared replied. "I guess this is one place we disagree on then."
"Yeah. And if you'd like to debate, we can, but I don't think that will make a difference."
"Probably not."
"Angie," Isaac spoke up out of the blue. "Er...and Jayda. Do either of you believe in theistic evolution even?"
"Not at all," Jayda said confidently as they both shook their heads. "I don't even think the Bible
suggests God would have used Evolution to create everything. Plus, the problem with that theory is that it demands death before sin. In Romans five, twelve, it says that death came into the world through sin--which was when Adam sinned. So, if, say, there really is a 'gap' of millions of years between Genesis one and two, or if each day of creation represented an 'age', then that requires there to be death way
before sin ever entered the world. So, I don't think either of those theories are biblical. They contradict both the Bible and the character of God as we know it."
"Speaking of contradictions," Jared cut in. "I’ve seen so many it's not even funny." His voice sounded a little cold. "How can you take the Bible seriously with all of its contradictions?"
Angie and Jayda smiled, though I couldn't figure out what was so funny. "Good question." Angie said. "I bet there are over a
hundred proposed contradictions in the Bible floating around on the internet. But, I'm sure for every one of them, there's an explanation also on the internet. Some of them are only guesses, but I've seen some pretty accurate and detailed answers!"
"Listen," Jayda started. "Most of the supposed 'contradictions' are a result of people taking the verses out of context--either historically, culturally, or whatever. Actually some of the new versions of the Bible have even
created contradictions by changing some things themselves, for whatever reason. But, besides those man made ones, the first thing to remember when reading the Bible is that it was written
for the Jews,
by the Jews, and
about the Jews. Israelites, technically. It's actually a collection of about sixty-six books--in multiple different genre's too--over a period of well over a thousand years, written on three different continents, by a number of different kinds of people throughout time like kings, fishermen, tax collectors, physicians, shepherds--and many more. So understanding the context is a
major key. If you read it from a modern, non-Jewish mindset, then you're bound to get confused about some things, or at least get an inaccurate understanding of the text. But, if you run into something that appears to be a contradiction, don't automatically assume it
is one. Also, if you run into something that doesn't seem to make sense, don't assume that it's senseless. Dig farther into it and find out about what's going on. Get some background information if it helps. The best background information you can get is about the Hebrew mindset--either the language, or the culture, or the history, or whatever. It's imperative that you get some of that information if you want to understand the Bible more fully. It will make a whole lot more sense, and clear up most of the supposed contradictions.
"But, once you've seen as many as Angie and I have, you come to realize that most, if not all, are either a result of misunderstanding the context or completely taking it out of context. If it really bothers you that much, try searching the web. Like Angie said, there are
mountains of proposed contradictions on the internet as well as their explanations--some valid, and some not so much. Might have to do a little digging, but it won't hurt. Anyways...does that help?"
"I guess," Jared responded.
Suddenly, somebody's ring tone went off--it was Freddy's. He reached in his pocket as he quickly got up and left the room. When he came back, he said, "I have to go soon. A friend might be coming over in a bit."
After he sat back down in his easy chair, Jayda's voice rang as she spoke. "So Freddy...you haven't really said a lot. What do you think? Have any questions? Comments? Objections?"
"...Sort of."
"Like what? Speak now or forever hold your peace...at least until next time."
He sighed after a bit of a pause. "I dunno, it's just...the Bible is interesting and all, but there are some things in there that...I just don't think I could ever agree with. And this god that you say is supposed to be all loving and everything...I see him as cruel and unmerciful. I'd never want to worship him. And maybe my view is wrong, but it's just how it is."
"Mind being more specific?" Angie asked.
He appeared to hesitate before answering. "What does your god say about homosexuality?"