Why I (Don’t) Believe – The Resurrection – Part I

A couple years ago a young lady, a college student perhaps, going by the handle Young88Apologist, took the time to read through one of my posts and left a long comment challenging my conclusions. There was nothing new to the comments, but what made her comment stand out in my mind is that she strongly recommended I reconsider my position by listening to an audio series produced by Pastor Chip Ingram, of Living on the Edge Ministries.

She couldn’t have known, of course, that I was very familiar with Pastor Chip, as he had been my pastor at Santa Cruz Bible Church from 1990 until I moved my family out of the area in 2001. I was very active and dedicated, running music and drama programs for most of my time there. Even though the church grew to 2,500 people, I had the opportunity to be personally acquainted with him and his family.

I was pretty surprised that, of all the apologists out there, she would choose the one guy I knew. Since then, I vacillated on whether I wanted to take the time to listen to the series. It’s over 4.5 hours of listening time, and I’m pretty sure I know what he’ll say. I may even have been there when he said it (I’m not sure when the series was originally recorded, but they consist of recorded sermons.)

So recently I’ve been interested in meeting my critics where they are and checking out some of the material they find so convincing. Continue reading

Science, Schmience

As my little cadre of readers know, my former pastor Chuck and I are engaged in a little debate around R.C. Sproul’s Not a Chance, in which Sproul takes on the idea of Chance as a factor in Existence. In doing so he contacted a scientist buddy or two, one of whom at least is also a bible-believing Christian, it seems. This guy, “Bob,” provided some commentary after reading through my blog that was half interesting, half a festering lump of offensive arrogance.

I’ll deal with the latter in a subsequent post, but I’m going to reproduce his comments here then address the points he brings up to see if they hold water. Continue reading