CADRE Comments

  Recently on Facebook, someone posted the following argument against the existence of God. He introduced it by saying that it was an argument that he had not seen very often, but he gave it the moniker “The Argument from Errancy.” The posted argument read: Premise 1. If the Christian God exists and wants to preserve His Word in the Bible, it is more probable than not that the Bible would be unambiguously inerrant and clearly of supernatural origin. Premise 2. The Bible is seemingly errant and man-made. Conclusion 1. Therefore, it is unlikely that the Bible is the inspired Word of God Conclusion 2. Therefore, it is unlikely that the Christian God would exist. The author then added these notes about Premise 1 and 2: P1 seems pretty straightforward. Jesus himself clearly saw Scripture as authoritative, and Paul says that all scripture is God-Breathed. Scripture would allow laymen to understand God. P2 requires more evidence on the skeptics’ part, but they can appeal to...

This is a follow up to the discussion questions that I posted under Screwtape Proposes a Toast, Discussion Questions, Part I .  As I explained when I posted the first part of these questions, this past winter I taught a class at my church on some of the writings of C.S. Lewis. Towards the end of the quarter, the class and I read through several short works by Lewis and discussed the content of each of the works in light of contemporary America. The short works were “Screwtape Proposes a Toast,” “Meditation in a Toolshed,” “Bulverism” and “Man or Rabbit.” The classes were each one hour long and mainly focused on the questions or concerns that arose from the materials.  I am posting hereunder my discussion questions prepared for the class for Lewis’ “Screwtape Proposes a Toast”, Part II. Some of the questions overlap with Part I because I used them as a way to ease the class back into where we were in the discussion when we left off.  I am purposely not posting ...

This past winter, I taught a class at my church on some of the writings of C.S. Lewis. Towards the end of the quarter, the class and I read through several short works by Lewis and discussed the content of each of the works in light of contemporary America. The short works were “Screwtape Proposes a Toast,” “Meditation in a Toolshed,” “Bulverism” and “Man or Rabbit.” The classes were each one hour long and mainly focused on the questions or concerns that arose from the materials.  I am posting hereunder my discussion questions prepared for the class for Lewis’ “Screwtape Proposes a Toast”, Part I.   I have posted part II as Screwtape Proposes a Toast, Discussion Questions, Part II .  I am purposely not posting my answers to the questions asked in the discussion questions. I want each person to work out their own answers in light of Scripture and what they may otherwise know of Lewis’ work. I would be happy to answer individual questions as they arise. I pray that t...

Yep, doing that already, thanks! {ironic g} Reason, by the way, tells me it isn't a myth. Not in the limited sense of 'fictional' being implied by the atheist group who sponsored the billboard. C. S. Lewis, the famous convert from atheism, the most famous proponent of the Argument form Reason, and arguably the greatest apologist of the 20th century, was very favorably impressed by the mythical characteristics of that story: the myth was as important to him, in his conversion to Christianity, as the history. But anyone putting up that billboard is more interested in rhetoric than reason anyway (billboards not being very conducive to reasoning in the first place, admittedly.) And it should be noted that we Christians put up signs at least as annoying to atheists and others--there's a good chance this is a satiric echo of such advertising or promotion. Still, their ad campaign at Christmas (is this the third year in a row now?) is always amusing, if not always in the way ...

(Note that this post is extremely tentative and exploratory; I have not framed the issues as well as I would like, and my sketch of the two approaches to divine action is not the best formulation they could receive. I'm simply jotting down some thoughts that I will expand more carefully in future posts) As a person who takes the current scientific consensus very seriously in the way I understand the world, one of the most challenging issues I face in theological reflection is how to understand God's action in the world, not primarily his creating and conserving the world in existence but those 'special' acts we ordinarily call miracles. The problem is that the narrative of modern science-certain controversies over the implications of quantum mechanics notwithstanding-is one of finding ever more precise regularities in the goings-on of the natural world, which many scientists are tempted to summarize as laws which govern the behavior of all objects in the natural world. ...

Little is said in the Bible about the spiritual body, i.e., the body that we will have in heaven. Not that Christians have been without understanding about various aspects of the resurrection body. The early Christians used a seed analogy to differentiate between the present earthly body and the resurrection body. 1 Corinthians 15:39-45 points out that our present bodies will have a different flesh than our resurrected bodies. Several verses about the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus also give us some hints as to what our post-resurrection bodies will be like. (A good summary of the Biblical teaching can be found in the Blue Letter Bible article on the spiritual body .) It is certainly true that our life in the world to come will be fundamentally different than the present life. In Matthew 22:22-32 , Jesus reminds us that the marriages of this life do not carry forward to the next life. Luke 24 suggests that the spiritual body can eat, but does not necessarily need to do so. Bu...

John Piper, author of Experiencing God , has an excellent resource available on-line entitled Don't Waste Your Life which seeks to remind Christians that there are many things that we can do during this life to occupy our lives, but most of these are ultimately wastes of our time. He encourages us, one and all, to not waste our lives, but rather to live in the way that God created us to live. In the first chapter of his book, I came across a short passage on the importance of C.S. Lewis in Piper's life. I thought it was quite possibly the best tribute I had ever seen to Lewis, so I wanted to set it forth here. Someone introduced me to Lewis my freshman year with the book, Mere Christianity . For the next five or six years I was almost never without a Lewis book near at hand. I think that without his influence I would not have lived my life with as much joy or usefulness as I have. There are reasons for this. He has made me wary of chronological snobbery. That is, he showed me ...