Bill Pratt | April 18, 2009
No. The Bible seems to clearly teach that God must call on man before man will respond. Original sin has caused man to reject God without God’s intervention. Jesus said, ““This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him” (John 6:65). The Psalmist said, “Surely [...]
Bill Pratt | April 17, 2009
A foundational issue for Christianity is the question of whether Jesus claimed to be God and whether his disciples understood him to be claiming he was God. This series of posts will examine the first question and we will follow this series with the question of the disciples. Here are the topics we will cover: [...]
Bill Pratt | April 14, 2009
I have written on this topic before, but it’s so important that when I come across more information, I feel compelled to write about it. Recently I was reading a book by Hugh Ross (More Than a Theory) and he listed off several stark contrasts between man and all other animals: awareness of right and wrong [...]
Bill Pratt | April 10, 2009
The Bible unequivocally teaches that faith in God is what saves. So the question before us is whether speaking a “sinner’s prayer” constitutes saving faith. All people possess intellect, will, and emotions – the ability to think, choose, and feel. When the Bible refers to faith, it seems to teach that faith involves all aspects of a [...]
Bill Pratt | April 7, 2009
Yes. There is absolutely nothing contradictory about an infinite God being in control of every little electron in the universe, but creating creatures in that same universe who have a special power of free will. God can accomplish everything he wants to accomplish in human affairs through human free will. While he commands volcanoes to erupt [...]
Bill Pratt | April 6, 2009
Because it is the best synthesis of all biblical data on the nature of God. All other views deny or ignore major swaths of Scripture. For example, on one of our blog posts, there is a thread where Darrell presented numerous passages to a Mormon about the oneness and unity of God. Instead of dealing [...]
Bill Pratt | April 4, 2009
So what about their arguments? Were they effective? First let’s examine Mike Licona. Licona has argued this historical approach for proving the resurrection in a book entitled The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, co-authored with Gary Habermas. The approach is fairly straight-forward and effective at making a historical case for the resurrection. Licona, along with Habermas, [...]
Bill Pratt | April 3, 2009
Last night, Darrell and I attended the debate between Bart Ehrman and Mike Licona at SES in Charlotte. They debated whether historians can prove Jesus rose from the dead. Here is my summary of the arguments that each of them presented. Licona opened the debate with a historical argument that goes like this. First, he [...]
Bill Pratt | April 2, 2009
In another hour, Darrell and I are off to see Bart Ehrman and Mike Licona debate the following topic: Can Historians Prove Jesus Rose From the Dead? The debate starts at 7 PM tonight at Southern Evangelical Seminary. We’ll give you a rundown in the next couple of days.
