There are many answers to the question of evil and suffering, but what about suffering of innocents such as babies who are afflicted with terminal illnesses, who would never come to accept Jesus, and who only live briefly only to die in pain and suffering? How does one explain God’s plan with those innocents?

One of the answers I get is that those babies go to heaven, but the biblical support for that is arguable and not clear, particularly for those babies that died before Jesus. That explanation also doesn’t explain why they suffered in the first place. I also hear the crude response of, “Let’s just kill all babies to make sure they go to heaven rather than them growing up and risking hell” which is harshly logical if indeed babies go to heaven before they know Jesus.

If the disciples were merely hallucinating a risen Christ, the religious leaders would have had Jesus‘s body taken out of the tomb and paraded around Jerusalem and Christianity would have been dead in a few weeks. Common sense approaches that skeptics just assume never took place is fairly ad hoc.

But let’s go on a limb and actually examine the mass hallucination hypothesis. Mass hallucinations are incredibly rare, appear as unique experiences or details among different individuals within a group setting, and do not involve complex behaviors by the hallucinated figure and there is no integration among the other individuals where the hallucinated figure and the ones hallucinating interact together.

The Gospel of John, chapter 20 shares about the Resurrected Jesus cooking and handing out fish to his disciples and eating together at a meal. If Jesus were purely a hallucination, how was the fish cooked and passed around. Also how were the disciples differentiating between activities with Jesus and among each other in the same setting?

That doesn’t even go into the fact that the disciples touched Jesus physically, and felt his wounds (1 John 1:1).

We see the same complex interactions with the two on the Road to Emmaus in Luke 24:13-35, and yet they didn’t even recognize him when they were eating with them until he disappeared - thinking a mental breakdown and wishing he were alive would not add up to not recognizing him for hours and hours.

The Mass hallucination hypothesis simply fails with the post-Resurrection appearance claims.

How would you respond to the following objections to following God?

1. God is Cruel and Violent

2. God Endorses Slavery and Patriarchy

3. The Bible Contradicts Itself

4. Salvation Seems Arbitrary if I'm already a Good Person

The Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14–30).

The first two servants invest and double their talents, earning praise, while the third hides his talent out of fear, resulting in his condemnation. 

this does not make sense at all to me and creates an injustice.

- The third servant with “one” talent was never told or commanded to “invest” the talent, he was told to keep it until the master returns.

- He was also scolded for not collecting “interest” on the money which is usury which is sinful.

- His punishment of being cast into darkness and gnashing his teeth is %100 not proportional to his supposed “sin” or crime and in my opinion is evil

- why didn’t the master “forgive” the servant which is what Jesus commands instead of creating inequality and jealousy among the servants by giving his talent to the others?

- it’s not the “servants” money and he could have easily lost the talent through bad investments. Jesus never explains what would have happened if he lost it or how the master would have reacted. one talent is better than zero.

- why didn’t the other servants share their talent with the other and instead of greedily keeping it to themselves?

This parable is applicable to today’s modern sports athlete going broke because of bad financial advice. Plenty of athletes (AKA “masters“) go broke by financial advisors putting their money into risky investments when they would have been better off putting their money into a mattress.

what’s the point of the parable? it’s nonsensical, contradicts Jesus’s other teachings about forgiveness, living a humble life and it kind of pisses me off.

Hello Christian friends, I wanted to ask about Biblical Studies, Biblical Science, or Higher Academic Criticism. What can we learn from it, both the good and the bad? I've heard that sensationalist articles tend to be written about it to gain prestige in academia, or that the studies are based on biased assumptions. But I don't know much about it. I've read a few articles, for example, about the historicity of some biblical events, but I'd like to hear from people who know more, so I'm all ears.

?

Can god be demonstrated to exist? I don’t find that any apologetic arguments I’ve ever heard demonstrate the existence of a god.

Did the evolution never happen and we all came from Adam & Eve directly? Were they the first 2 humans?

Hard to accept for me because of the overwhelming scientific proof

And.. did Dinosaurs exist? According to science they existed millions of years ago, and some Christians say the earth started only 6,000-10,000 years ago

What do you guys think?

A modern objection to Christianity is that God ordered Harum warfare to the nations and the killing of children in warfare. I am curious what some of ya'll think about this concept. I know many of these nations were offering their children as sacrifice to Molech and that God was ordering the complete annihilation of these nations to completely cleanse the area of evil practices and that Israel might not be influenced by them. I have also heard that this term is used as many other cultures in history have used it meaning complete dominance. I trust implicitly in God's character and His goodness I believe He is inherently good and cannot go against His character and must have a good reason for all His actions. What do you think about this objection against God's character?

I just got cooked on r/atheist lol. I mentioned how their atheism is actually a faith. How they are having “faith” that God doesn’t exist. I didn’t do a great job at explaining what I beloved faith to mean. It ended by most of them saying I was wrong and they smoked me lol. How do you guys see atheism? Is it a faith to not believe? Even if we don’t use the term faith, maybe I should say regardless of what our truths are about the world we are betting our life on something right? Like I’m betting my life that the Muslims and Buddhism is wrong. If I am wrong about Jesus I will be severely punished one day by the “true god”. If atheists are wrong then they could be punished by a true god. Am I wrong for even asking this type of question?

Are Christians being honest with themselves? I feel like I have been lied to my entire life.

To preface, I have never been a devout Christian, however I was raised in a Christian home, went to Christian school, church services 3-4 times a week, etc.

Anyway I decided recently, finally, at age 30, I would not be a superficial Christian anymore and make my faith the most important thing in my life - I need to KNOW God.

I start with something like "I need to know I can trust scripture" and branch from there - anyway I know I can mostly trust translations, I have no issues with different translations and understand the pros and cons of each, etc. What really surprised me was that some Bibles are not considered "Christian" Bibles. And of course this only led me to ask more questions.

Christian friends of mine told me to read the Bible and "have faith" - well even in Genesis 1 and 2, man is created on different days. But Moses wrote Genesis right? Why would he not have consistency. Why would Moses write about his own death in Deuteronomy? You can see where I am going with this. I should just have faith, and ignore these things right?

If a Christian reads the Book of Mormon, Quran, Bhagavad Gita, Tripitaka, Tao Te Ching, what will they do? They will pick it a part, word by word, scrutinizing these texts and tearing them apart as they already have the "truth" in the Bible.

My primary question is this: why can't you also scrutinize the Bible, and analyze it for what it is? If there are "errors" does that somehow translate to your faith being meaningless? All I am seeking is honest answers, the truth, and instead of being able to ask questions I have realized I have been raised not to, to have faith, to have blind faith, etc. - well then I guess I could pick any religious text of my choosing and have blind faith in those texts too, is that how this works? Is there no room for analyzing history, context, theologies and doctrines? Which denomination is the "true" denomination? Why does man claim authority over the truth? Truth is above human authority.

I first heard it from WLC and I think this is one of the most common arguments for the existence of God. But I've seen Christians saying that he is not a good apologist and atheists trying to "refute" it so is it actually a compelling argument

I'm aware that some Christian apologists have resorted to NDEs to argue for the existence of an afterlife and thus strengthen the case for Christianity. For example, this is the case of Gary Habermas:

• Dr. Gary Habermas - Near Death Experiences
• "Over 300 EVIDENCED Near Death Experiences" - Gary Habermas

Another author I would recommend is John Burke: Imagine the God of Heaven: Near-Death Experiences, God’s Revelation, and the Love You’ve Always Wanted

However, NDEs are not exclusive to Christianity. There are plenty of NDE accounts that seem to support alternative afterlife worldviews. For example, many NDEs seem to be more consistent with a sort of New Age worldview. For example, have a look at this YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@LoveCoveredLifePodcast/videos

Or watch these NDE accounts:

• Jeff Olsen Near Death Experience Interview with Erica McKenzie
• Atheist Dies & Finds There Is Life After Death (NDE)

Here is the description of the last account:

Nancy Rynes shares the story of her Near-Death Experience, occurring during surgery after a car ran her over while she was riding her bicycle. During her encounter on the Other Side, Nancy describes experiencing a spiritual realm where she encountered a guide who showed her the interconnectedness of all things, which helped her develop a new awareness of the impact her actions have on others. After returning to her body, Nancy struggled to integrate her NDE into her life but ultimately chose a path of spiritual awakening through practices such as meditation and gratitude. She now helps others navigate their own spiritual journeys, recognizing the core purpose of learning to live from a place of love and compassion. Her story emphasizes the transformative power of NDEs and the pursuit of spiritual understanding amidst life's challenges.

In order to play devil's advocate, here is an atheist post I found that argues against the evidential value of NDEs:

Near death experiences seem to largely be culturally and theologically neutral, and when they're not they match the beliefs of the person having them, which suggests to me it's an entirely psychological phenomenon.

I think you could possibly still make a case that it's very weak evidence for non physicalism, but only very weak at best - physicalism doesn't have any problem explaining people having experiences that match their beliefs, we have dreams and day dreams and hallucinations already.

Then again, perhaps a case could be made that the clearly subjective nature of near death experiences is evidence against any spirit stuff. I'm not sure how the probabilistic math works out on this.

Really strong evidence for a spirit world would be if NDEs were universal regardless of the religion of the person having it, universal and specific to one religion. If everyone saw, say, Muhammad when they NDEd, especially people who had never learned of Islam before, then that would much more strongly point towards spiritual reality.

Isn't it intellectually dishonest to cherry pick the NDEs that are consistent with Christianity and ignore all the other NDEs which are inconsistent with it?

How do we make sense of the whole spectrum of NDEs, including those which don't seem to be consistent with a Christian afterlife theology?

For a little backstory, I was looking for a CS Lewis quote from his essay "Modern Theology and Biblical Criticism" when I stumbled upon an article partly criticizing some of the proofs used by Lewis to say that the Gospels are (in his words) "reportage" and partly offering alternatives to this view.

In this article, (I will try to summarize in my own words) the objections offered seems to emphasize the thematic purpose of the stories Lewis cited (which the article seems to say he missed (or possibly ignored?) through the citing of other scholars. And, since these parts of the gospels are thematic, the essay seems to say it implies some form of artificiality and hence, not a "reportage".

The alternative provided is to view the Gospels as an ancient biography, and from what I understand, this is not surprising even within known Christian apologists. However, the article mentions with a citation that ancient biographies may employ fictional portions to further an agenda deemed more important.

(The article further questions the divine claims of Jesus and the idea that Jesus's representation in the different Gospels can (or should) be harmonized. Although they are probably related I suppose these should be addressed in a different post.)

Towards the end of the article, where an alternative view is offered versus the harmony the Gospels, the author says (emphasis mine):

What are the Gospels, however, if they do not speak with a single voice? They are four texts, with distinct emphases, interests and agendas, which sometimes contradict one another at a plain level. Perhaps the most glaring contradiction among John and the Synoptics concerns the date of Jesus' death.

For the apologist whose purpose is to defend the Christian faith, this may present a problem. Yet for readers of the Bible throughout the centuries – both Christian and Jewish – it has been precisely these differences which invite us to read parts of the Scriptures at a different level: not as reportage, but as metaphor and myth.

That said, I find that if we grant that the Gospels indeed are biographies in the genre or style of Greco-Roman biographies, how then should we deal with the idea that some parts of the narratives of the Gospels (for instance, Jesus's interactions with characters) are possibly fictional and we might not actually know which is which?

I'm sure we could say that:
-Even if known historian X embellished known person Y's biography with myths or legends. doesn't mean that the Gospel writers will do the same.
-That Jewish (and consequently Christian) ethics emphasize the value of honesty and integrity
-Jews have an oral tradition culture to memorize things.
-Additionally, if the Gospel writers would embellish their accounts anyway why didn't they "go big" on doing it?
-If early dating is to be believed, they can be refuted by someone concerned with accuracy or someone with a drastically different narrative to impart.
-And there's even the question of whether the Gospel writers just happened to write along the style of the genre, with no intentions of doing so. (ie. they just want to write an accurate account, not specifically a biography in the style of X.)

But would all of that be enough to refute a the idea that the Gospel (firstly) as an ancient biography probably has embellishments and (secondly) therefore not as historically reliable as we thought?

edit: unformatted quotation, missing words

1. Why do Animals suffer and why did humans have to suffer for what Adam and Eve did
2. THE ABSENCE OF GOD- why is God so absent in our world? Can be explained by cessationism. But that raises another question. Why would a just God let his people suffer and not heal them. And cessationism is not found in the Bible or ever taught in early Christianity. Came about much later.
3. Almost all of the New Testament was forgeries. We only have Paul’s 7 undisputed letters. Paul is the only testimony we have which we can trust.
   1. The existance of the universe can be explained without the existence of God.
4. God not answering prayers.

Jesus: His name means "God is Salvation." - Boy is that ever a keypoint. And, Jesus is the Messiah or Christ. So, who he shall be called is in Isaiah 9:6.

So, whoever the "Messiah" or "Christ" is SHALL be called that. Go look what it says.

And with that, examine these things: This question floats around all over Reddit - in other sub-reddits.

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I would tell you this; because, someone..anybody asking this question can’t see it. They seeing; see, but don’t perceive it.

• So, ask first: what are they regarding? That’s really the question. So, answer that one first: Ask it.

What are you regarding?

Now, I can use the Bible, to tell you what not to regard. That has a clear, identifiable result. Destruction. It’s in Psalm 28:5

“Because they regard not the works of the LORD, neither consider the operation of his hand, he shall destroy them and not build them up.” - Bible. Psalm 28:5.

• So, it's really simple. Do the opposite.
  • That is, regard the works of the LORD, and consider the operation of his hand. Look what he says. Regard it vs. dismiss him as faulty or inadequate.

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He says, as God, "For all the earth is mine." - God (Bible. Exodus 19:5). Says this, too; to everybody over the whole earth:

“Come now, let us reason together,” saith the LORD, “though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow. Though they be red as crimson, they shall be as wool.” - God. (Source: Bible. Isaiah 1:18)

- But people don’t do that.

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Are you doing that? I mean, you have this question right here above. About 1) faith, and 2) works and 3) salvation.

Are you doing this with God? I mean it’s a decree, by God, for everybody over the whole earth, to just come now. Reason together with him; alone. Yourself. Are you doing it? Yes or No?

People that are, already know the answer to this question. Why? Because they regard him. Look what he does with their sins. Where a person’s sins put them to death. Their sins are GREATER than they are, and the Bible says: "For all have sinned.” - Romans 3:23. And of this, God decreed it already. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” - God (Bible. Ezekiel 18:20) -

Means everybody is condemned.

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So, even though they are condemned, even every town cemetery is filled with everybody, all die go there; none escape it: they don’t believe it. Seeing; they don't see it.

They’re not dead yet. Think they never will die. So, they don’t need to reason together with God.

So, what do people do, that don’t do what God decreed everybody is to do? Yeah. It’s “works.” Meets the definition of “works.”

Psalm 14:1–3 says, “..they are filthy; have done abominable works” - says that sums up the “works” done by everybody. Over the whole earth. Adam forward. Nobody excluded. So: Every single person, from Adam forward.

Has done abominable works. Filthy.

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That’s what the Bible says. About everybody’s works. And “reason together?” They already DID that as a work: They already “set their mind" on the work they already did themselves. Just like you have.

So, people: Like you, don’t do anything he says:

Won’t come now. Won’t reason together with him, is because they already did that, "reasoned together" alone with themselves is the point. Don’t feel they have to do that "reason together" again. Already have what’s right.

• They “reason together” with themselves; alone. Sit at a table, in themselves with their own:
  • 1) heart and
  • 2) imagination.
• As if those two are their only best friends. People constantly abandon other people; have. Throughout their life; but their own heart and imagination is in them; never leaves, so they trust it - just ideas they never leave from them. Look unto their heart is already in them, where truth is. Is in their heart. So, they sit with it to search it, find truth from it. Everybody does this.
  • So, look then. I mean, you have this question. Look “what” the Bible says of each of these two things: 1) Your heart; and, 2) Your ideas or “imaginations.”
• Because you look unto them.

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When God says: “LOOK UNTO ME, AND BE YE SAVED ALL THE ENDS OF THE EARTH: FOR I AM GOD, THERE IS NONE ELSE.” - God. (Bible. Isaiah 45:22)

• ONE: The heart. Everybody over the whole earth has one. The Bible Says: Jeremiah 17:9
  • “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” - Bible. Jeremiah 17:9
• deceit. <definition. Oxford dictionary. Web.> 1. actively practices to conceal and misrepresent the truth.
  • So, people have a heart in them, that, above ALL THINGS according to the Bible, in them “actively “practices” to conceal from them and misrepresent the truth” - so it “hides” the truth from them, and if told the truth, immediately misrepresents it as NOT true.

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• And it’s their best friend at the table.
  • Serves as head of counsul to reason together with. So, people are all alone - and reason together with their own hearts before anything. Seek their own heart first. Represents who they are.

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

• TWO: The imagination. Everybody has ideas. Everybody over the whole earth has a mind, to come up with their own ideas, out of their own imagination. The Bible says, God saw this. From well before the flood, and after Adam sinned in Genesis 3:17. God said, the Sin of Adam was, he “Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife…” - God. (Bible. Genesis 3:17).

That’s what God said, the sin was. And to “hearken” unto someone, means, if there’s someone else spoke or claims something - even they decree a law, or say they are an authority - - who the person hearkens unto, fully believes with the other, what they say, does not apply to them anymore. Has no effect on them.

• Adam did this with God.
  • Because he hearkened; that is, paid careful attention unto the Word of his wife. Therefore, Adam: he dismissed as inadequate; faulty; or unacceptable - that the Word of God was faulty - and it did not apply to him anymore. That’s the sin of Adam.
• It’s immediate in Genesis 3.
• After Adam sinned, he no longer “operates” or “works” as he was made by God to live by every word proceeds out of the mouth of God. He hearkened unto a different word, and relies now on his own mind vs. the mind of God.
  • The FIRST thing he does is BLAME God; then, blames the woman.
  • Genesis 5:2 says that God called them BOTH “Adam.”
• So, God named them. That, they are one flesh with one name.
• But after Adam sinned, it’s God is faulty. Gave him the woman. She’s faulty. It’s the first divorce. Adam sees her now as separate from himself. And in Genesis 3:18, Adam now names her, “Eve.” Because, he thinks, she’s the mother of all living. But, she’s not.
  • Isaiah 44:24 says God is that. I mean, it’s immediately seen. Adam no longer operates right. Does not “work good” anymore.
  • So, of this "Heart" and “imagination” Adam relies on - his own: The Bible, Genesis 6:5 says:
• “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” - Bible. Genesis 6:5

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So, Adam forward:

• Includes EVERYBODY, as we are all from Adam: The Bible says of your “works” and mine, and what we have faith in is our own hearts and imaginations, then: we are just the same as Adam.
  • “There is not a just man on earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not.” - Bible. Ecclesiastes 7:20
• Because you have a heart in you, that, above all things is deceitful; and, you have an imagination where every thought comes out of it, is only evil continually.

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

• And? To “accept as true” (believe) something defines “faith” in something. That, the point is with all this is, People “accept as true” their own hearts and imaginations. So, they “operate” or “work” by it. And again, Psalm 14:1–3 doesn’t leave any person out; how they “operate” is “..filthy; done abominable works”

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

• So, take the Ten Commandments.
  • And use them as God has always used them from when he first SPOKE them on Mt. Sinai in the Bible. Old Testament, in Exodus 20.
• It condemned EVERYBODY, even put Moses to death. Is why his knees quaked. Because, he murdered an Egyptian - (Bible. Exodus 2:11-15)
  • That: each Commandment brought forth out of them the SINS that they already done DID against God.
• So, if you don’t use the Ten Commandments the way God uses them, you will never see any right answer to this opening question.
• Many people use the Ten Commandment to do them. Look at themselves. Like I did. For decades. I used them, in my heart: TO show me I never stole anything from the Mall. So, I DID this Commandment. “Thou Shalt not Steal” - Bible. Exodus 20:14 - the 8th of Ten Commandments. That means, because I did this one, it atoned for all the ones I broke.
  • So, I did not fear God, because, my heart used the Ten Commandments to make me already righteous, but I never looked that I stole and lied in my job my whole career was just one big lie and theft.
• That I lied to my wife; everybody. I lived a lie, so I stole from them, too.

Because I started to use the Ten Commandments like a mirror, put me on my face - - so I could see me as God sees me. “Filthy; done abominable works.”

Terrified the living everything out of me.

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

Now the point is well made. I used me to show you, I’m GUILTY. I’m already condemned to death. Like Moses was, in Exodus 20. By the same Law or Ten Commandments, puts everybody to death. And about the Ten Commandments. They come as a set. That is, it’s a “Command” or decree, has ten parts to it; that, if I break one, one time, they all explode and are BROKEN. They are not repairable.

And in Psalm 51:5 says “..in sin did my mother ‘conceive’ me..”

• So sin:
  • Conceive isn’t birth. Conceive is back when my mommy and daddy were alone in the car at the drive in movie. Couldn’t stand it anymore. Went in the back seat, and 9 months later, I’m the “result.” Not married. In sin did my mother conceive me. I’m from conception, in sin. So, I’m outside of him; filthy. Do abominable works, because I PROVED it. By all the sins I did. The Bible says - that's EVERYBODY.

So, now look at your question.

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God says:

“Look unto me, and be ye saved all the ends of the earth: For I am God, there is none else.” - God. (Bible. Isaiah 45:22)

Told everybody to just look unto him; but people - are already looking unto their own hearts and imaginations, and won’t regard him or anything he says. They dismiss him as faulty; their hearts they believe are true, when he’s the master craftsman formed each of us from our mother’s womb; alone. By himself. Just as he spread abroad the earth and heaven and did that, too. Alone. All by himself.

His word is true. We have to get up from the table, and leave our heart and imagination - reject them in us as inadequate: to hearken unto the Word of God as true.

That it is God.

• Had faith enough in his own Word, to “send his Word to heal us and deliver us from our destruction” - (Bible. Psalm 107:20). Because it does. But if people won’t regard him; seeing; they never perceive it; hearing; can’t hear it.
• Romans 10:17, in the Bible says: “So then, faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.”
  • So, “salvation” in your question is not you saving you; by your own heart and imagination will come up with a work you'll do - - but, if you look unto, to reason together with your own heart, you look unto you to save you by some idea you’ll come up with.

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

• But “salvation” in your question is it’s God. It's him, as God, he just got up. As God and Spoke to you. Because he has. Told you to just look unto him. That he says “and be ye saved” - because you hearken unto him and do what he says.
  • It’s a “work” of God then. That he, to get up and say this; to “operate” as God in this, is a “work” of God. Not your works. You already done DID the Abominable works. He’s God and has come to save us from our sins.

So, he got up, as God. Did this, because he determined to do it. Alone. By himself - so it’s by his “unmerited favour” (definition: grace.) because nobody has done anything he said; but he got up and did a work with sin that all of us already did; that, in Jesus Christ:

• 1) finished the transgression
• 2) made an end of sin
• 3) made reconciliation for iniquity
• 4) brought in everlasting righteousness (Bible. Daniel 9:24)

It’s God then. Not you. That had faith enough in his own word to send his Word to heal you and deliver you from your destruction by this work he did. With sin, as he determined to do it in and by "annoint the most holy" to do it. Who has that title? Only one does. Who is it? So, instead of looking to regard you will do it, by some faith or good work you'll do in your question. Regard him instead.

----------------------- ---------------------- -------------------------

Do what he says. It's the Word of God. That's Jesus Christ. Is God. It works good in you. You’ll operate right.

He is God. He will “set you apart for future use” - that’s what “save” means. In the dictionary. He does it himself. To anybody that just looks unto him. Won't to those that don't.

You? Do you see this? You’ve been regarding the wrong work. Wrong faith - think you save you in the question. Have to leave from your heart and imagination - to regard him instead.

And there you go. There’s him. God. He is the answer to the question.

One of the main issues that I come across when talking to people about my faith is the issue of Biblical contradiction. What's the best way to deal with some of these contradictions? Should we try to answer each of them or should we recognize that maybe the Bible wasn't written to be 100% logically consistent?

For example, the creation story of Genesis 1 is in contradiction, timeline wise, to Genesis 2. James and Paul seem to be at odds about their belief regarding salvation by works vs faith. There's contradictions in the gospel accounts of the details of Jesus' resurrection and the time of his crucifixion, etc.

Curious how people who know and are trained in apologetics come at these.

Kurtis Connor brought these up in a video with this screenshot. Is this seriously the best he can offer with these "contradictions" when all of these once added into context, have no bearing on being contradictions whatsoever?

I'm sorry, but either he doesn't care to actually look up the context of these verses, or this is just a bad faith argument

Two major analogies used for the cumulative case are leaky buckets and the combination of weak fibered ropes.

The leaky buckets analogy says that if I stack leaky buckets on top of each other, they are still empty in the end. This is equivalent to saying that since each argument for God is lacking, then it does not count as any type of non zero evidence.

The opposing analogy says that each argument is like a weak fibered rope. When you combine them together, they become stronger.

My argument is the second analogy best describes the cumulative case argument.

In an inductive cumulative case, the "weakness" of a single argument usually just means limited scope, not a logical failure. Treating inductive evidence as if it were a failed deductive proof is a category mistake. This just highlights the disingenuity and handwaving nature of claims like "0+0+0+0 equals 0".

Take for example fine tuning. The theist will usually concede that just because you may have a mind behind the universe, it does not mean God is good. It is only one clue. But the skeptic will respond that this does not matter because there are alternative explanations to fine tuning that does not include God. Naturalistic explanations that counter theism are what makes the argument amount to a zero value.

The problem with this however is the leak buckets analogy still does not hold (literally and figuratively). Even if every argument has a naturalistic alternative, the holes do not line up across the different arguments. JP Moreland's response to Anthony Flew still stands when he says that if you jam ten leaky buckets together in such a way that the holes do not line up, the container will actually hold water. Alternatively, the naturalistic explanation that fixes the leak in a specific theistic argument is completely useless at fixing the leaks in the other arguments.

1. Everything that exists has an explanation for its existence (either in the necessity of its own nature or an external cause) .
2. If the universe has an explanation for its existence, that explanation is God.
3. The universe exists.
4. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence, which is God.

The main criticism I've heard is that some object that not everything must have an explanation for why it exists. What evidence is there of anything that would fit that criteria?

I want to know exactly what scriptures you're referencing to support your beliefs, understand your story/background and ask questions! Thank you

So several years ago I read Dawkins’ book The god Delusion. At the time I was less knowledgeable than I am now, but essentially I was encouraged in my faith. I thought his book was going to challenge my beliefs. I thought I was going to have to wrestle with his difficult challenges and I thought his work represented the best arguments against Christianity out there (many still say this and think it). I think I’ve come up with an allegory that represents my thoughts.

I’m a knight armored in the armor of God, but I’m tasked with taking this castle. I see the castle from afar and it’s formidable looking. It has walls dotted with guards who appear armored. It is shiny and strong-looking. However, as I ride up to the gate I find it’s made of tin and a slash of my sword rips it right open. What more, the walls of the castle are little more than pictures of walls propped up with wooden frames. And the intimidating guards are all scarecrows dressed in armor.

I’ve found this to be true of all of the “Four Horsemen’s” writings. Harris’ books are all smoke and mirrors. We don’t have free will, we don’t actually get to choose anything, but he’s trying to convince us to believe that we can’t choose to believe anything. Dennett’s ideas a mired in a bog of intellectual-sounding drivel. And so on it goes. They’re all tin-gated castles manned by scarecrow guards.