05Aug 2020 by Post

8 Tips to Discuss Politics, Race, Religion and Other Controversial Topics

Apologetics, Christianity, Controversial Topics, Faithful Thinkers, Legislating Morality, Culture & Politics, Luke Nix, Politics, Race, religion
By Luke Nix Who has not been exposed to or may be even involved in discussions of controversial topics these days? It seems that talk of politics, race, religion, and a whole host of other controversial topics are swirling around us everywhere we go. Some topics we can ignore and avoid, and others we get sucked into. Some discussions we get reluctantly and others we get into too eagerly. There are numerous pitfalls to having these discussions that we all want to avoid, so today, I want to offer eight tips for discussing controversial topics that will hopefully help your discussions be more productive and respectful. Being that the USA is in an election year (2020), politics seems to be on everyone’s mind, so let’s start with this quote from…
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03Aug 2020 by Post

Marx Attacks!

Bible, Christianity, Critical race theory, critical theory, FreeThinking Ministries, God, Karl Marx, Legislating Morality, Culture & Politics, Phil Bair, Politics, Racism, theology, Worldview
If I were to ask you who the most influential philosopher of the 21st Century is, what would your answer be? The correct answer might surprise you. It is Karl Marx. Karl Marx believed that class struggle would occur naturally on its own without the help of any social engineer. He believed the Communist Revolution was the inevitable outcome of socio-economic forces, and it was only a matter of time. He was wrong. The marxists of today believe in the class struggle, just like Marx did in his day. Except that now, the new Marxists recognize that it won’t naturally happen on its own. They have forged a new agenda to bring about a social revolution similar to the one Marx imagined. Except this time the intended outcome will be…
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01Aug 2020 by Post

What Is The Fine-Tuning Argument For God’s Existence, And Does The Multiverse Counter It?

2. Does God Exist?, Apologetics, Christianity, Creation, creator, designer, Evidence, existence of God, God, multiverse, The progress of science, theology, universe, Wintery Knight
By Wintery Knight  One of the best arguments for the existence of a Creator and Designer of the universe is the cosmic fine-tuning argument. The argument argues that individual constants and quantities in nature cannot be much smaller or larger than they are, because it would remove the ability of the universe to support life of any kind. Dr. Michael Strauss, an experimental physicist, explains some examples of the fine-tuning in a recent post on his blog. He writes: I liken the finely-tuned universe to a panel that controls the parameters of the universe with about 100 knobs that can be set to certain values. If you turn any knob just a little to the right or to the left, the result is either a universe that is inhospitable to life…
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29Jul 2020 by Post

Book Review: How Reason Can Lead To God by Joshua Rasmussen

Apologetics, Bible, Christianity, Free Thinking Ministries, God, How reason can lead to God, reason, Stelman Smith Jr., theology, Theology and Christian Apologetics
By Stelman Smith Jr. “I write for a specific sort of person. You value reason, science, and independent thinking. You question beliefs propped up by ‘faith’ without sufficient evidence. Maybe you would like your life to have a deeper purpose, but you cannot believe something based on a mere wish. Whether you are a student, an academic, or just a curious person, you want one thing: the truth. If you can relate, this book is for you” (Rasmussen).  In what promises to be one of the great Christian Apologetics books of all time, Dr. Josh Rasmussen leads us across a bridge of reason. A bridge that begins with his own doubts and questions as a teenager. A bridge built by the tools of reason, on which we can learn to think…
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27Jul 2020 by Post

Christian Naivety is Harming the Church’s Engagement with Today’s Culture

Christianity, ChristianMomThoughts, Christians, Culture, Discernment, Legislating Morality, Culture & Politics, Natasha Crain, Politics, society, theology
By Natasha Crain I had no idea my last article, “5 Ways Christians are Getting Swept into a Secular Worldview in This Culture Moment,” would resonate with so many—it’s been liked and shared over 250,000 times to date (!). Although I no longer leave comments open on my site (I just don’t have the time to moderate and respond), I had the opportunity to observe a flurry of conversation threads on social media related to what I had written. Those conversations threads generated all kinds of ideas for future articles, but the one that pressed on me most over the last few weeks was this one. As I considered the types of pushback I received from some fellow believers (not skeptics!), I started to realize that their comments had little to…
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25Jul 2020 by Post

God is the Good

Apologetics, Bellator Christi, Bible, Brian Chilton, Christianity, God, God is the Good, Good, theology, Theology and Christian Apologetics
By Brian Chilton At our church, we often say, “God is good all the time, and all the time God is good.” But do we really contemplate what that means? What is the good? What does it mean to say that God is good? Around 420 BC, the famed Greek philosopher Socrates conversed with a gentleman named Glaucon about the nature of goodness and justice. Socrates held that an objective standard of the Good existed which transcends personal opinion and belief. Plato, Socrates’s student, analyzed their conversation in his book The Republic. Plato likened the Good to the sun as both provided individuals clarity of sight. As the sun allows one to see in the visible realm, the Good allows one to see in the realm of rationality and metaphysical truths. Like…
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18Jul 2020 by Post

Why We Can’t Know If The Universe Created Itself

Al Serrato, Apologetics, Atheism, beginning of the universe, Christianity, Creation, God, Theology and Christian Apologetics, universe
By Al Serrato In the beginning, was… not the Word …. but the singularity event occurring in absolute nothingness and timelessness that spontaneously created all we see in the universe around us.  So said physicist Stephen Hawking anyway, in his popular book The Grand Design, where he explained that spontaneous creation is the reason why there is something rather than nothing. It is not necessary to invoke God; he concluded, “to light the fuse to set the universe going.” “All it takes is gravity and the existence of, well, multiple other universes.”  Soundbites like these can be disturbing for people of faith. More to the point, they can provide false comfort to those who prefer to suppress their innate knowledge of God. In a recent conversation with a skeptic who…
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15Jul 2020 by Post

How Jesus “Emptied Himself”

Apologetics, Christianity, God, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Jesus Deity, JesusIsNotFakeNews, Ryan Leasure, theology, Theology and Christian Apologetics
By Ryan Leasure Few biblical texts receive as much attention as Philippians 2:5-8. It reads: Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Theologians have spilt much ink over this text. After all, it’s a rich Christological text which proclaims significant truths about the nature of Christ. But far and away, the most controversial part is the phrase “but emptied himself.” What does this statement mean? The Dilemma Does this mean that Jesus…
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11Jul 2020 by Post

An Intro to Arguments for God’s Existence

2. Does God Exist?, Apologetics, Christian Apologetics, Christianity, Doubts, Evidence, existence of God, faith, God’s existence, J. Brian Huffling, Questions, Reasons, Skeptics, Theology and Christian Apologetics
By J. Brian Huffling Does God exist? This has been one of the most asked questions in history with the most profound implications. As Norman Geisler used to say, our view of God’s existence is most important since it determines what we think about everything else. There are many arguments for God’s existence. This article will examine the standard classical proofs with typical objections and evaluations. The proofs for God are varied and different, but they can be classified as either a posteriori or a priori. The former means the proofs are based on (or after/post) experience, while the latter are allegedly not based on experience, but prior/apart from it. A posteriori proofs are empirical in nature and take it that we can trust our senses. A priori proofs start…
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04Jul 2020 by Post

The Best Kind of Love

Apologetics, christ, Christianity, Culture CrossExamined, Free Thinking Ministries, free will, God, Gospel, If God why Evil, Jesus, Love, the problem of evil, theology, Theology and Christian Apologetics, Tim Stratton
By Tim Stratton Question: Dear Dr. Stratton, In your interview with Jorge Gil on Cross Examined’s Hope One, you attempted to answer “all the problems of evil” by appealing to love. In fact, you said that “the best kind of love requires libertarian free will.”  Surely this is false, for I can think of a counter-example that clearly shows this to be false. After all, the members of the Trinity are the epitome of perfect love and they do not have libertarian free will. They cannot do otherwise. They must love by necessity. So how can “the best kind of love” require libertarian free will? – Phillip Tim’s Response I am thankful for your question, Phillip! When I read it I could have kicked myself for not providing this vital clarification…
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