14Jan 2026 by Post

Should I Read the Bible? What Christians Should Know

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, Bible study, Christianity, Devotional, discipleship, Gospel, Heaven Not Harvard, Jennifer Defrates, Quiet Time, Spiritual Disciplines
Wondering Should I read the Bible? Maybe you’ve never picked one up. Maybe you’ve only skimmed it and never really read it with purpose. Either way, the answer is yes. If you’re a Christian or wondering about Christianity, nothing will change your faith and life more than reading the Bible. Reading the Bible daily is the most important habit any believer can have. It’s so important to read God’s word, deeply and thoroughly, that I say all Christians should be saturated in the Bible. Becoming deeply saturated in the word changed my relationship with God forever. I spent too many years full of misunderstanding and carrying legalistic burdens because I didn’t have an accurate understanding of the Bible and didn’t really know God for myself. My superficial relationship with His word had stunted my…
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07Jan 2026 by Post

Is the Bible No More Credible Than the Book of Mormon?

4. Is the NT True?, Alex O’Connor, Apologetics, Bart Ehrman, Christianity, Evidence, Gospel, historical apologetics, Latter Day Saints, LDS, Mormonism, Sean Redfearn
Bart Ehrman (see timestamp 12:51 – 17:46) and Alex O’Connor (see timestamp 1:12:40 – 1:14:32) have both tried to undermine the eyewitness argument for Jesus’s resurrection by comparing it to the eyewitness testimony for Mormonism’s golden plates. Both Alex and Bart challenge Christian apologists with this question: “Why do apologists reject the eyewitness testimony of Mormonism when their reasons for believing in Christianity are founded on the eyewitness testimony of the apostles?” Are they right that this is a double standard? After all, Mormonism has a total of twelve eyewitnesses for its key claim about the golden plates. In addition to Joseph Smith’s testimony, eight witnesses say they saw the golden plates, plus three more witnesses say that an angel showed them the plates. There are a few simple points…
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05Jan 2026 by Post

How Does Paul’s Relationship with the Jerusalem Church Present a Problem for Islam?

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, Christianity, Church History, Gospel, Islam, JonathanMclatchie.com, Paul, Were the Apostles Muslims?, World Religions
In a previous article, I offered a simple reason why the Qur’an cannot possibly be the word of God, since the proposition that the Qur’an is the word of God entails a necessary contradiction. Here, I am going to present an equally compelling reason to reject the Qur’an as the word of God. As I alluded to in my previous post, the Qur’an contends that the disciples of Jesus were Muslims. According to Surah 3:52, “…when Isa [Jesus] sensed disbelief in them, he said: “Who are my helpers in the way of Allah?” The disciples said:“ If The Apostles were Muslim . . . So according to the Qur’an, there is no question that the apostles were Muslims, under Jesus. But what if we could establish that the teaching of…
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31Dec 2025 by Post

A Simple Reason Why the Qur’an Cannot Be the Word of God

4. Is the NT True?, Bible, Islam, Islamic Apologetics, JonathanMclatchie.com, Muslim Dilemma, Quran, World Religions
The Islamic religion claims that the Qur’an, revealed allegedly by the angel Gabriel to the prophet Muhammad beginning in 610 A.D., is the inspired and inerrant word of God. Such an assertion, however, is highly problematic, and many, many arguments could be given to convincingly refute it. In this article, I am going to offer one of those reasons, which I perceive to be the most damning. My argument here can be summarized in syllogistic form as follows: Premise 1: Either the Bible is the Word of God or it is not. Premise 2: If the Bible is the Word of God, the Qur’an is not. Premise 3: If the Bible is not the Word of God, the Qur’an is not. Conclusion: Therefore, the Qur’an is not the Word of…
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22Dec 2025 by Post

Did Jesus even claim to be God?

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, BrianHuffling.com, Christianity, christology, classical theology, Gospel, Is Jesus God?, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Trinity, watchtoward society
I sat down with some Jehovah’s Witnesses who were visiting with me. The elder who was leading our study stated that Jesus never claimed to be God. Jehovah’s Witnesses argue that Jesus is a created being. Liberal “Christians” argue that Jesus never claimed to be God. Many other groups say the same. If such is the case, then Christians have some explaining to do as they teach that Jesus is God. But did he ever claim this title for himself? Let’s look at what he actually said. I am going to argue that, yes, Jesus in fact did claim to be God. This can be seen by the fact that he claimed to be identical with God in various ways. Jesus Claimed to Be Identical with God Jesus made statements…
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10Dec 2025 by Post

The Book of Acts is High-Resolution Reportage, Part 2

1st Century, 4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, Apostle Paul, Book of Acts, Christianity, Gospel, historical apologetics, Jonathan McLatchie.com, reliability of the Bible
[Editor’s note: in Part 1 of this two-part series, Jonathan explained this method of historical argument known as “Undesigned Coincidences.” These are lines of evidence that emerge when one part of Scripture explains, resolves, or entails, unplanned detail from elsewhere in Scripture and the the wider historical record. Jonathan focuses on the evidence from four books of Paul – Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, and Galatians – comparing them with narrative details in the book of Acts.]        Paul in Macedonia Paul indicates that he is writing 2 Corinthians from Macedonia while on route to Corinth (2 Cor 9:1-5). This would place it very shortly following the riot in Ephesus, hence at approximately Acts 20:1. This appears to have been on Paul’s mind in 2 Corinthians 1:8-10: “For we do not want…
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24Sep 2025 by Post

Early Church Persecution, and its Evidential Value: Part 2

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, Christianity, Church History, Evidential apologetics, Gospel, JonathanMclatchie.com, persecution
[Editor’s Note: This blog was originally a single article. For the purposes of reposting it at Crossexamined, it has been divided into two parts. Click here for part 1.  [Excerpt from Part 1:] In this article [series], I . . . discuss the evidence that the apostles did in fact encounter hardships, dangers and persecutions on account of their Christian convictions. [In part 1] I survey the evidence for a general context of persecution (what may be called the indirect part of the case). [In Part 2] I will . . . proceed to argue that the apostles in particular voluntarily submitted themselves to danger, hardship and persecution on account of their conviction of the gospel’s truth. The Persecution of the Apostles — Evidence from the Apostolic Fathers   We now…
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22Sep 2025 by Post

Early Church Persecution, and its Evidential Value. Part 1

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, Christianity, Church History, Evidential apologetics, Gospel, JonathanMclatchie.com, persecution
The argument from Christian persecution was developed most fully by William Paley, in his 1794 book, A View of the Evidences of Christianity.[1] Indeed, Paley devotes the first nine chapters of his book to defending the thesis “that there is satisfactory evidence that many professing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.”[2] This proposition, if true, goes a long way towards establishing that the early apostles — that is, those who were purportedly witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection — were sincere in their conviction that they had encountered the raised…
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10Sep 2025 by Post

Why Demanding Extraordinary Evidence Makes Little Sense

3. Are Miracles Possible?, 4. Is the NT True?, Al Serrato
Many skeptics approach “the evidence” for Christianity with a closed mind. Hobbled by a number of presuppositions, they typically end up where they begin: convinced that God simply would not have made himself so difficult to detect. Many will back up their position with a challenge – because Christian claims are so “extraordinary,” they say, only “extraordinary evidence” will be sufficient to persuade them. Upon reflection, however, it is quickly apparent that this is a rather odd, and in the end self-defeating, way to go about the task of acquiring knowledge. It’s odd because it demonstrates a misunderstanding about the way evidence works. It’s self-defeating because reviewing evidence is supposed to be done so that one can arrive at the truth about what occurred, and when one option – that…
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30Jul 2025 by Post

Why Biblical Authorship Matters: A Test Case

4. Is the NT True?, Apologetics, bellatorchristi.com, biblical apologetics, Biblical authorship, Christianity, Crucifixion, Daniel Sloan, Gospel, Inerrancy
On April 14th 2025, Christianity Today published an article entitled “Was Jesus Crucified with Nails?” In the article, the author asserted that it was likely that Jesus was not nailed to the cross but was instead tied to the cross with ropes. He argues this by appealing to an authority, a professor from Gordon College, who has made this argument based solely on some limited archaeological data. Indeed, in the article, the professor is cited as saying, “he wanted to explore the issue because it’s good to question tradition and people can benefit from closer scrutiny of history.”[i]   Did the Article Miss the Johannine Reference to the Nailprints?    When the article was published, it immediately came under fire on social media. After all, John 20:25 clearly states, “The other disciples therefore…
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