Discipleship – Divine Council

Apologetics

Mathematician James Nickel on ‘The Unrelenting Issue of Intelligibility’

By Terence Gillespie August 1, 2019

James Nickel explains why mathematics work. Or, as scientists put it: “The Unrelenting Issue of Intelligibility.”

He also describes why most mathematical breakthroughs (and mathematicians) are driven by the pursuit of beauty rather than utility.

How could it be that mankind is able to predict behaviors in the universe based only on abstract mathematical principles “invented” in his mind?

Could it be that mathematics is the language of God’s creation?

Nickel expands on this theme and topics in his excellent book, Mathematics: Is God Silent?

Even better, he’s finally fulfilled his life-long ambition to create a math curriculum that inspires the student by tying math with wonder, meaning, applications, & philosophy. He calls it “The Dance of Number.” Perhaps the myth of mathematics having no applicability to life and daily inspirition are finally over!

Believers

Nepalian Christianity: Church Evictions, Providence, & Online Exorcisms

By Theo Theo June 14, 2019

Jai Mashi from Nepal!

In my last two updates, we discussed a US lady being possibly deported from Nepal. That news has gone global and been reported in a recent edition of Decision Magazine. So, readers of this blog may be getting more up to date information from this “scholar on the ground” than mainstream sources. Bear in mind, however, that gleaning the truth from Asia’s version of “fake news” is no easy task. As I wrote in my last update, the lady has not yet been deported. Christians have rallied, and with prayer and support from around the world, the authorities chose not to pursue the case.

The same police official in charge of investigations in Eastern Nepal and the closing of a Christian school was the in charge of this case in Western Nepal. He had been transferred and is using his post to attack Christians. You can find all of this in my previous posts. God is good!

Spring Teaching Term Complete

I have completed my present teaching term and my students are now pursuing the secular requirements for their degrees. Upon completion of those exams, they will graduate in August. My students are concerned about how they will share what they’ve learned with their local village churches. Please keep this in mind in your prayers for them.

During the break, I’ll be continuing my Ph.D. Studies, which need lots of attention. I’ve also been taking courses to train myself up in many new tools to meet the growing need to get content out both here and abroad. These are truly is exciting times!

God’s Providence: An Ever-present Reality!

God’s providence continues to make itself known as an ever-present reality. For example, I’ll have a conversation with someone only to find out that another has been secretly working on a project to address the same need! Also, the Lord keeps putting people in my path at just the right time to assist in learning the things I need to move forward.

Fledgling Nepalian Christianity

Christianity is still a fledgling faith in Nepal. Christian academics must be vigilant to properly serve the church in the wake of many cults from Korea and the US. Many believers here have a limited understanding of Christianity and are challenged by new ways of thinking, especially within Christian scholarship. It is essential to help guide them towards the best ways of thinking and those ways are not always well-received. Those of a simplistic mindset resist the vastness of the content in which they’re engaged.

The pastors in the villages are often merely those who can read Nepali and translate it into the local language. They have little to no formal training and my teaching on Christianity is inevitably more profound than what they were previously led to believe. This makes it especially urgent to make content available to fight heresy within and outside of the church. Also, the youth of my students is a cultural barrier to the acceptance by their elders. Previously held doctrines are held in high regard despite obvious inferiority to modern scholarship. Elders tend to think my doctrinal clarifications require them to deny some aspect of Christ. It’s hard for them to let go of wrongful or imprecise thinking to embrace the greater riches within our faith.

Churches Being Evicted or Destroyed

Land is extremely expensive in Nepal, most churches cannot afford it and it’s especially difficult for Christians to find a place to rent for worship. In the wake of the Easter 2019 attacks in Sri Lanka, a nearby church was evicted when pressured to do so by locals and police (who were afraid that what took place in Sri Lanka could happen in their neighborhood.) The church is now meeting in separate small groups spread among rental houses also subject to eviction should landlords find out they’re being used for worship. Many pagans here find Christian worship offensive and will use any means available oppress minority religions.

Another land-owning church is under consideration to be forcibly razed. With the new constitution, and subsequent laws and amendments concerning preserving Nepalese culture, any property that was formerly, at any time, temple grounds can be “redeemed” (especially if any competing religious institution has been erected.) Therefore, a local church, one of the oldest in Nepal, had purchased land nearby a temple but that land had also initially belonged to a temple and had exchanged many hands subsequently. The church bought the property from private owners decades ago. Now people are deeming it worthy of “redemption.” The church in question will be forced to leave, receive no compensation and lose their entire investment.

This anti-Christian attack, ironic considering the mandate of the preservation law, is a blow to Christian morale. How does one preserve history by destroying one of the hallmarks of Nepalian Christianity? The message is clear: State forces in Nepal are as willing to destroy the historical roots of Christianity as their counterparts in the Middle East.

Nepal is doing the very thing they say they are opposed to: destroying Christian landmarks while claiming to have a policy of preservation. It is how the current party in power in India began when the same issue over a Hindu temple was raised concerning a Muslim mosque.

State News

In the past week, we’ve had a series of bomb blasts in the capital; a sad reminder of the decade long civil war that plagued Nepal after its recent overthrow of the monarch. Maoists continue to be a problem: their leader is honored by the current administration for “maintaining peace” despite the thousands they’ve killed in the process.

Indian elections have concluded and, despite media predictions, the Hindu party in power has prevailed. Nepal wants to follow the same trend. The majority are Hindu; however, the communists won the majority and have formed the new government.

An Online Exorcism?

Lastly, a recent attempt to rape a 7-year-old girl (while asleep in our church) was thwarted and the girl was unharmed. The father is Hindu and has been known to be demon possessed. He had turned to Christ to be set free but returned to his Hindu roots shortly after that. After this incident with his daughter, he was repossessed. After many prayer meetings, we were able to coordinate several believers, both here and in the US, and engage in a “real time” exorcism. Amy “Beth” of Hesed Place, a former guest on the NakedBible podcast, and the indigenous pastor here who translated Supernatural into Nepali worked together to help the victim in finding meaningful peace and deliverance. We also consulted with Doug Overmyer from Seers See Ministry for guidance as the event lasted over several days. Doug is part of Mike’s Peeranormal Podcast and also was featured on the Bible Over Brews Podcast on episodes 36 & 38.

The father has joined our church to be alongside his family and be discipled in the faith. They’ve moved closer to the church to get away from the place where the rape attempt occurred. I also conferred with Fern & Audrey of Discovering MErcy for some further advice and will coordinate with our own local pastor to see he gets further assistance in his journey. We hope to get Mike’s next book translated, as well, to assist us until I can devote time to producing much-needed content upon completion of my doctoral degree in Biblical Studies. We are also planning a conference here in conjunction with the release of the translation to get the book out to the people. Thanks to everyone who supported us behind the scenes.

Thanks to all who continue to support us in the work we do here. It is exciting to take the light of Jesus into the dark kingdoms of this world as a beacon of hope! As we get the time, we hope to be keeping you abreast of the new avenues of content production with which we presently have in the works. God continues to confirm our present trajectory.

Apologetics

Evangelical Gnosticism

By Guest Post June 7, 2019

by Abigail Rine Favale

I teach in a great books program at an Evangelical university. Almost all students in the program are born-and-bred Christians of the nondenominational variety. A number of them have been both thoroughly churched and educated through Christian schools or homeschooling curricula. Yet an overwhelming majority of these students do not believe in a bodily resurrection. While they trust in an afterlife of eternal bliss with God, most of them assume this will be disembodied bliss, in which the soul is finally free of its “meat suit” (a term they fondly use).

I first caught wind of this striking divergence from Christian orthodoxy in class last year, when we encountered Stoic visions of the afterlife. Cicero, for one, describes the body as a prison from which the immortal soul is mercifully freed upon death, whereas Seneca views the body as “nothing more or less than a fetter on my freedom,” one eventually “dissolved” when the soul is set loose. These conceptions were quite attractive to the students.

Resistance to the idea of a physical resurrection struck them as perfectly logical. “It doesn’t feel right to say there’s a human body in heaven, when the body is tied so closely to sin,” said one student. In all, fewer than ten of my forty students affirmed the orthodox teaching that we will ultimately have a body in our glorified, heavenly form. None of them realizes that these beliefs are unorthodox; this is not willful doctrinal error. This is an absence of knowledge about the foundational tenets of historical, creedal Christianity.

At some point in my Evangelical upbringing, I came across a timeline of world history. The timeline started with Adam and Eve, then moved through significant events recounted in the Old Testament, with a few extra-biblical highlights from elsewhere in the world spliced in here and there. The fulcrum of the timeline was the birth of Christ, followed by details from his life and ministry, then post-Resurrection events from the Book of Acts. All these episodes were demarcated by bright colors, with neat lines stretching upward into the margins, connecting each sliver of color to a corresponding label. After Paul’s ministry, however, this busy rainbow of history dissolved into a dull purple rectangle spanning fourteen centuries, labeled simply “the Dark Ages.”

This is an apt illustration of all too many young Christians’ sense of Christian history. The world after the New Testament is blank and uneventful. Even the Reformation is an obscure blip. They are not self-consciously Protestant, but merely “nondenominational.” Their Christian identity is unmoored from any tradition or notion of Christianity through time.

My students are a microcosm of what I see as a growing trend in contemporary Evangelicalism. Without a guiding connection to orthodoxy, young Evangelicals are developing heterodox sensibilities that are at odds with a Christian understanding of personhood. The body is associated with sin, the soul with holiness. Moreover, this sense of the body, especially under the alias flesh, tends to be hypersexualized.

Nowhere is this more pronounced than in the Evangelical emphasis on purity, a word that has become synonymous with bodily virginity. Despite the biblical usage of purity as holiness in a broader, holistic sense, including but not limited to sexual matters, the word “purity” has become narrowly sexualized. It is not a virtue to be continually cultivated, but a default physical state that can be permanently lost.

In Evangelical vernacular, “sins of the flesh” denote specifically sexual sins, and these are the evils that dominate the theological imaginations of young, unmarried Evangelicals, far more than idolatry, say, or greed. I can remember one particularly vivid illustration from my Evangelical youth, when I was asked to imagine myself on my wedding day, in a pristine white dress—and then asked to picture a bright red handprint anywhere that a man has touched me. This image of a bloodied bride, of flesh corrupted by flesh, seared into my imagination a picture of the body, rather than the soul, as the source and site of sin.

This is not a new misunderstanding. The view of embodiment as the epitome of evil was a central tenet of Gnosticism, which St. Irenaeus refuted in the late second century. But the notion that our fall is metaphysical, not moral, persisted. In the early fifth century, St. Augustine faced an interpretation of St. Paul that placed the Apostle’s warning about the weakness of our flesh and our bondage to carnal works within a Platonic framework. For the Platonist, the material world and the spiritual world are distinct and hierarchically ordered; the material is illusory, temporary, imperfect. The body is the seat of harmful desires and passions, from which the soul must be released. The body weighs down and corrupts the soul.

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Bible

10 Distinctives of Biblical Counseling

By Guest Post May 16, 2019

by Paul Tautges

People often ask me how biblical counseling differs from other approaches to soul care. Here’s a summary I’ve been teaching for almost two decades, which I hope will help you grow in understanding sanctification. This week, look up the Scriptures listed and meditate on God’s abundant provision through the Spirit and the Word. See how each piece fits together. This study will be a healthy meal for your soul.

Biblical counseling believes:

1. The Bible is the all-sufficient source of Truth.

Scripture is pure truth (Ps. 119:140, 160).
Scripture is sufficient to identify the deepest needs of our soul, and meet them (Ps. 19:7-11; 2 Tim. 3:16-17).
Scripture is the instrumental means the Spirit uses to transform us from the inside out, even sanctifying our motivations (John 17:17; 2 Cor. 3:18; Heb. 4:12).
Scripture is the judge of all man-made philosophy and theory, as to whether or not it is accurate, corrupts the gospel, or diminishes Christ (1 Cor. 2:11-16; Col. 2:8-10; 2 Cor. 10-4-6).

2. Man is totally depraved, accountable to God, and responsible for his thoughts and actions.

Man’s heart is wicked and deceitful (Jer. 17:9).
Man’s heart is motivated by love for self, and is addicted to sin (Gen. 6:5; Rom. 6:13).
Man will give an account of himself to God (Rom. 14:12; 1 Pet. 4:4-5).
Man is responsible for his own temptation and sin (James 1:13-16).
But man can be rescued and redeemed by Jesus Christ—becoming a new creature in Him (2 Cor. 5:17).

3. God’s goal for every believer is to be like Jesus Christ.

The Christian life begins with regeneration, being born-again by the Spirit through the Word of truth, the gospel (John 3:1-8; 1 Pet. 1:3).
God has predestined believers to become conformed to the image of His Son, thus this is God’s goal (Rom. 8:29).
God is renewing the believer’s self into the image of Christ, as we put off the old and put on the new (Col. 3:9-10; Eph. 4:17-32).

4. The Holy Spirit is the agent of heart change, which produces change of behavior.

The Holy Spirit transforms us into the image of Jesus Christ as we behold Him in the Word (2 Cor. 3:18).
The Holy Spirit progressively trains us in godliness and develops new attitudes and lifestyle as we walk in the Word (Gal. 5:22-25).

5. Every Christian is fully equipped in Christ for godliness, but submission to God’s training is required.

God’s power is sufficient to live a life that is pleasing to Him, having already been accepted in Christ (2 Pet. 1:2-7; Eph. 1:6).
God will finish the sanctifying work which He began at conversion, but not without the personal discipline of the believer (Phil. 1:6; 2:12-13).
Suffering is one of the chief means the heavenly Father employs to train us in godliness and discipline (Heb. 12:4-11).

6. Sanctification is a process requiring ongoing repentance and personal discipline toward godliness.

Discipline the thoughts of the mind (Rom. 12:1-2).
Discipline the desires of the heart (James 4:1-3).
Discipline the habits of life (Eph. 4:22-32).

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Culture

Avengers: Endgame and the Problem of Evil

By Terence Gillespie May 7, 2019

Along with my regular blog here at seanmcdowell.org, I am now featuring occasional guest posts from some students in the Biola M.A. in Christian Apologetics that I personally had the privilege of teaching. This post is from my friend Tim Stratton, who has an excellent and growing ministry of his own. I simply asked him to write anything on his heart and mind. Check out his ministry and enjoy this post! Sean McDowell

Avengers: Endgame and the Problem of Evil

By Tim Stratton

The problem of evil (a.k.a., the problem of suffering), in my experience, is by far the greatest reason atheists offer for their lack of belief. In a nutshell, the problem of evil/suffering comes down to this: Why would a perfectly good, loving, and all-powerful God allow so much pain, evil, and suffering in the world? Since many cannot make sense of this, they often either get mad at God and resent Him, or they simply abandon their faith altogether and become atheists.

Avengers Assemble!

Avengers: Endgame, however, provides Christians a unique opportunity to help non-Christians who struggle with the logical problem of evil and suffering, to see that this problem is really no logical problem at all.

Doctor Strange used the time stone to not merely look forward into the future to see what WILL happen, but to evaluate over 14,000,000 “alternate futures” (otherwise known as “possible worlds”) to see what “WOULD happen IF.” Doctor Strange is doing this because although it is not logically impossible for the Avengers to defeat Thanos (of course that COULD happen), he wants to see if there is a possible world that could be actualized (what philosophers and theologians describe as a “feasible world”) in which the Avengers actually would defeat Thanos!

Doctor Strange explains that he examined over 14 million possible alternate futures, but out of the multi-millions of possible worlds surveyed, he knows of only one in which the good guys actually defeat Thanos in the end. One in 14 million is typically thought of as “horrible odds.”

Many thought the ending of Infinity War was one of despair. I, however, was filled with hope. This is because it seemed that these “alternate futures” were not merely based on chance alone, and that Doctor Strange gained knowledge of how all of these super heroes and villains would freely choose in each of the millions and millions of possible worlds he examined. Possessing this knowledge of how these super-powered persons would freely choose in each of these possible futures (similar to what theologians refer to as God’s “middle knowledge”), it seemed to me that Strange freely chose himself — and did everything in his power — to make the possible world in which the good guys would win the actual world in which the good guys will win. Indeed, right before Strange fades away at the end of Infinity War he tells Tony Stark, “It was the only way.”

The Heroic Dr. Strange

As we see in Endgame, this “best feasible world” according to Doctor Strange, is the one in which the greatest number of persons flourish and the evil of Thanos is eventually conquered. As Strange tells Stark in Endgame, “If I tell you what will happen, it won’t happen!” Be that as it may, this particular world is also filled with temporary, but extreme amounts of pain, evil, sadness, and suffering before the ultimate good can be realized.

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Church

Holy Week or Weak?

By Theo Theo May 3, 2019

Jai Mashi from Nepal!

Holy Week or Weak?

Here is a brief update of my previous week. This is round #2 compared to what we experienced early in 2019. God is in control. I am here to help the locals to encourage them. We sure appreciate all your prayers.

On Good Friday, I had a meeting nearby. After completing it, I noticed I had a flat tire on my bicycle. I found a shop to fix it where I thought I lost my phone. Instead, I merely misplaced it on my bag, fortunately. Conversely, on Easter Sunday, bombings ravaged the region in nearby Sri Lanka, an island nation south of India which is south of Nepal. ISIS apparently targeted Christians in answer for the recent massacre of Muslims in New Zealand. Some are estimating over 250 dead and many more hospitalized.

The Sincerity of New Believers

I have learned here that just like momentum in sports, politics, or even a battle as tides turn, it does affect people here even traumatically. Many see this as a time of the end. Those here in Asia seem to be much more deeply affected as members of the body and have a far more profound empathy for such incidents than I experienced in my life as a Westerner back home. Life here is much more communal in nature. Believers here sense a much stronger connection with each other and even of those abroad they see as family. They are among the youngest siblings globally with a church history in Nepal of mere decades and not centuries. They look to others in a particular way that is hard to describe in sincere kinship.

Persecution & Electricity Theft

The very next day (Easter Monday) four people were arrested in far western Nepal by police. One was an American. They were supposedly guilty of violating the anti-conversion law that went into effect in August of last year. She was deported on Wednesday evening. Incidentally, my uncle’s funeral in the States was also on that day.

Meanwhile, the nearby transformer blew on Tuesday evening leaving us without power for over a day where I rent. My guess is someone each evening is stealing electricity and finally blew it. Hard to catch them at night. That night my oldest daughter was up most of the night sick and vomiting. Here is a strand of bird flu that is currently affecting local chickens. We haven’t eaten in a while and now won’t.

Earthquakes on Wednesday

We awoke Wednesday morning to earthquakes. The first I felt since January of 2016. Thursday was the fourth anniversary of the 2015 Earthquakes that rocked the nation for almost a year and for many recoveries still alludes them. That night my youngest daughter was up also with sickness. I awoke to diarrhea and had to administer exams. The school’s office let me know the gov’t was coming to visit to inspect the school. They are hoping to delay it until my current term ends at the end of May.

On my way home, we had more rain. In fact, it is raining now again. We have not even started the monsoon season. I am concerned for the farmers and those out in the villages whose homes are primarily made of mud. When the monsoons do come, I am not sure the infrastructure can handle it. Lots of mudslides and the loss of lands plus the concern of earthquakes.

We seem to be healthier this morning. Lots of sicknesses are perhaps due because the of the rains and cooler temperatures than usual for this time of year shifting the climate quickly week to week from cold and wet to hot. The weather changes make it challenging. Many are sick here. One child in the church needs surgery today due to infections.

Visa Due in May

Lastly, my visa is due in May. We pray it goes well. Everyone seems to think I should be fine. One never knows. This thread has a lot of news related to Nepal here to keep you updated. For those interested in “seeing” more of Nepal, I found this mini-documentary illuminating. Thank you all for your continued prayer support! Just click here to subscribe!

Atheism

9 Prayers for When Your Friends Don’t Want to Know God

By Guest Post April 30, 2019

by Madeline Twooney

I have been a Christian for almost 10 years; however, my friends don’t know Jesus. This hasn’t affected our friendship negatively, though it is on my heart that my friends know the joy of being in a loving relationship with our Savior.

The Great Commission instructs us to spread the gospel and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:16-20). Thus, in the past, l have given testimonies to my friends of God’s goodness or even just straight up talked to them about the Bible. However, this has only deterred them from wanting to know God. So, instead, l started to pray for my friends.

Do you too, have friends who don’t want to know God?

Here are 9 issues of faith your friends might struggle with and prayers you can pray over them:

1. “Does God even exist?”

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” (Psalm 19:1)

One afternoon, one of my oldest friends asked me this question completely out of the blue.

Convincing a friend of God’s existence is not an easy task considering that science, society, and even their own intellect try to convince them otherwise.

Prayer

Sovereign Lord,

We thank You that at the beginning You spoke into the darkness and created heaven and earth. If all creation responds to Your voice, if the winds move and the mountains shake at Your command, how can we doubt that You are the Creator, the ruler of all?

Thank you for the life of my friend. Please open his eyes, Lord, that he may see Your presence, just like You opened the eyes of Elisha’s servant and he saw the hills covered by horses and chariots of heavenly fire.

Help my friend to see what l see when l look upon Your face, precious Lord, for You are worthy to be honored.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

2. “I don’t want to be accountable to God.”

“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32)

I have a good friend who claims to be an atheist. In reality, she acknowledges that God exists—she just doesn’t like Him.

My friend believes that God wants to judge her lifestyle and take away the freedoms she enjoys, so she shuts down at any mention of Him.

Prayer

Precious Father,

l commit my friend into Your hands. I stand in the gap for her and ask for forgiveness on her behalf as she denies You and all that You have done for her in her life.

Lord, please help my friend to see that true freedom comes from the bond price that Your precious son Jesus Christ paid for our sins. Help her to see this truth, for the truth will set her free.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

3. “When l see proof that God exists, then l’ll believe in Him.”

“For we live by faith, not by sight.” (2 Corinthians 5:7)

A former colleague of mine has traveled to many countries. He believes in the beauty of experiencing new cultures and learning new traditions because he has seen the existence and value of these things on his travels.

However, he will only believe in God once he has seen proof that He exists.

Prayer

Almighty God,

Thank you that You are faithful and that we see Your faithfulness when we step out, believing in You, Your mercy, and wonders.

Lord, l bring my friend before you. Please give him the sight to see Your goodness in the land of the living—not with physical eyes, but with eyes of faith.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

4. “I was a Christian, but l’m not anymore.”

”So, he got up and went to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.” (Luke 15:20)

When l first came to Christ 10 years ago, a colleague of mine guided me in my initial days as a Christian. However, a few years later, my friend stopped going to church. Additionally, any attempts l made to talk with her about God were met with disinterest. To this day, I still don’t know why.

Prayer

Merciful Lord and Savior,

We thank You that You never loosen Your hold on us, no matter what we are going through, for You are always faithful, even when we are not.

As You know Lord, my friend has decided that she doesn’t want to walk with You anymore. I pray that this change of heart is temporary and that like the prodigal son, she will make her way back home to You, where You will welcome her back with open arms.

We thank You that with You we will always find grace. And, that we will always belong to You, and You to us.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

5. “A Christian hurt me and now l don’t trust God.”

“The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18)

A few years ago, my friend received the information that a colleague of his, who is a Christian, had said negative things about his struggle with alcohol.

Understandably, my friend was very hurt by this news. He associated his colleague’s judgment with God’s view of him and it affected his ability to trust God.

Prayer

God of compassion,

Thank you that where we are imperfect, You are perfect. Forgive us when we don’t behave in the shadow of Your image; help us to forgive each other in such situations, as Christ forgave us.

Lord, thank you that You see my friend’s hurt and that You wipe away his tears. Help him to forgive those who have hurt him and learn to trust in You.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

6. ”God doesn’t help me with my problems; why should l follow Him?”

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Apologetics

6 Things You Can Tell Your Kids to Explain Pain and Suffering in Our World

By Guest Post April 30, 2019

by J. Warner Wallace

Devastating storms, killer earthquakes, record-setting fires and horrific acts of evil dominate recent news headlines. Why would an all-loving, all-powerful God allow these things to happen? Is God just unable to stop this kind of evil? If so, why call Him all-powerful? Is God unwilling to stop this kind of evil? Then why call Him all-loving? Some non-believers offer the existence of evil as proof that God doesn’t exist. What should we tell our kids when they observe (or even experience) evil?

Our conversations will certainly look (and sound) differently depending on the age and maturity of our kids, but in all the years that I have been discussing the “problem of evil” with students (either at conferences or as a youth pastor), several key issues continue to dominate my discussions. When explaining why an all-loving, all-powerful God would allow natural disasters (or human evil), consider incorporating the following truths:

Remind Your Kids That Eternity Can Helps Us Cope with Evil
All of us hope to live a long life without free from pain or hardship. What if we knew, in advance, we were going to live forever and experience a pain-free existence for all eternity? Would we view pain and suffering in our temporal life differently (even if it lasted for many years) if we knew we would eventually experience bliss forever? Remind your kids that God offers us life beyond the limits of our short, material existence; we are eternal creatures. All experiences of evil must be considered in light of eternity.

Remind Your Kids That God Loves Us Enough to Allow Us Free-Agency
A loving God would create a world in which love is possible, right? Love requires each of us to act freely, because true love cannot be coerced. God didn’t create us as robots; instead, He gave us free will so our expressions of love would be genuine. But, this also means we have the freedom to ignore God’s commandments and behave badly. Remind your kids that much of the evil we experience in the world is the result of humans who freely choose to disobey. God may allow some evil because free agency is required for love to exist in our world.

Remind Your Kids That Some Suffering Can Actually Develop Our Character
As a parent, you’re probably more concerned with your kids’ character than their comfort, and character is far more likely to be developed through adversity than advantage. Hard times can bring out the best in all of us, providing us with opportunities to help those in need, rise to the occasion, and come to the rescue. Remind your kids that God may allow us to suffer discomfort because He knows it will develop our character, especially since we are eternal creatures. God cares more about our eternal character than current comfort.

Remind Your Kids That God Can Use Some Evil to Call Us to Himself
Many of us ignore God until something happens to get our attention. Tragedy has a way of redirecting our thoughts and pointing us to a life beyond our current struggle. If God has designed us to be with Him in eternity, He might use hardship to refocus those of us who haven’t been paying attention. Remind your kids that some forms of evil may simply be part of God’s loving effort to point us in the right direction.

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Christianity

8 Faith-based Films Worth Your Time

By Guest Post April 27, 2019

by Jesse Carey

“Christian” movies don’t exactly have the greatest reputation among film watchers. Christian cinema’s apocalyptic thrillers, morally concerned family films and social-issue stumping dramas have often been criticized for being a little too preachy for non-church goers, lacking the subtlety of their Hollywood counterparts.

Of course, there’s nothing that makes a movie (or any other piece of pop culture) “Christian,” but films with overtly Christian messages have in some ways, become a sub-genre of their own.

Here’s our look at eight movies with Christian messages that will restore your faith in redemptive films.

Believe Me

Believe Me follows the exploits of a group of college guys who attempt to pay off their student loans by crafting a fake, charity:water-type nonprofit and keeping the donations for themselves. Along the way, they discover they’ve got a gift for crafting the sort of highly emotional, faux-substantive Christian “worship” experiences that grease the pockets of the faithful, but they also start to come to terms with their own hypocrisy. Watching the dudes learn to perfect their Christianese is a stinging riot, but Believe Me has a lot more on its mind than just laughs.

Amazing Grace

The 2006 film about William Wilberforce’s campaign to abolish the slave trade in Britain works on several levels: It’s a gripping historical drama; it’s a compelling story about social activism and it’s a moving testimony to the power of faith and reliance on a higher calling.

Blue Like Jazz

The film adaptation of Donald Miller’s best-selling memoir may not have captured the same breakaway success as the book, but the movie remains a pretty charming indie. Unlike many traditional “Christian” movies (or films that are targeted to Christian audiences), Blue Like Jazz isn’t afraid to embrace the complexity of faith, coming of age and thinking about God. Like the book, the movie enjoys asking questions and exploring doubts, but ultimately, finding truth.

Into Great Silence

In 1984, filmmaker Philip Gröning asked Carthusian monks in a remote French monastery if he could make a documentary about their lives. Sixteen years later, the monks agreed. The resulting documentary is a wordless, but gripping, look at the lives of the reclusive monks who have devoted themselves to God and the Bible. What’s captured on camera is like a time-capsule from a group of men dedicated to prayer, and it soon becomes clear why their order’s motto is “The Cross is steady while the world is turning.”

The Mission

Based on actual events, the 1986 drama starring Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons is an emotional story of redemption, forgiveness, persecution and devotion. Set at a Jesuit mission in the South American jungles during the 1700s, the movie is about fighting injustice and how grace can be used to overcome the most powerful forces of might. It’s a hard-hitting movie featuring one of the most iconic scores in history. Don’t miss it.

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Christianity

Free Christian Movies to Watch for Easter Week

By Terence Gillespie April 17, 2019

Yesterday was Darren Wilson’s “Finger of God” and today is his “Furious Love”. WP Films is making their films watchable for free during Easter week!

I’m half-way through Furious Love and can now recommend it. Here’s the trailer:

I don’t know what movies will be shown, tomorrow, so tune in to find out!