Photo: John Snyder
Every discussion we might ever have about Christianity comes back to the Bible. It is the ultimate source of Christian doctrine, and as such Christians cling to it tenaciously. We can, and do, argue endlessly about interpreting the Bible literally or metaphorically, about it’s historical accuracy, and about it’s original authorship, but there’s a bigger question here that overshadows all of these.
Why would a God, with the most important message of all time, with the power to communicate it any way he choose, choose to transmit this message via the printed word? A book is relatively slow to transmit, easy to cherry-pick and misinterpret, and every translation into another language runs the risk of losing the nuance of the original. A book may appear to be “just another magic book” when compared to the Quran, the Vedas, the Agamas, the Guru Granth Sahib, the Avesta, the Book of Mormon, Dianetics, the Tao Te Ching, and on and on.
This is God we’re talking about here! If he wants to set himself apart from all the impostor gods out there, he should do something no other god could do! He could appear to everyone, personally, under no uncertain terms – speaking to them directly in their own language, so clearly that his message could not be misunderstood. I’ve heard it argued that it would be a violation of free will for God to appear in person, because how could you not choose God once you’ve basked in his glory?
Well, a skeptic could easily remain hard-hearted and dismiss the appearance as a dream or hallucination. Furthermore, we know Lucifer and his rebel angels were once in God’s presence, and yet they still chose to turn against him. God’s personal appearance would do no more to take away our free will than Jesus appearing to his disciples took away their free will.
Instead, we’re left with just another magic book. How are we to ascribe divine qualities to a message presented in the most human of methods?
sleeping in sundays 