Thank you for the honest conversation. Remember “perfect” is the standard you bring to it. It’s difficult not to bring meaning and intent to the text – but you must read the text and let the meaning speak for itself (see Rosaria Butterfield link below.) In your search you need to resolve your requirement between “perfect” and the Church’s claim of “inspired”.

I should add that my denomination, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS), believes the Bible was inspired by God but written by people. We believe the Holy Spirit did not give the Biblical writers a heavenly vocabulary, a celestial grammar, or divine attributes such as omniscience. Through men of human capacities the Holy Spirit spoke divine truth. Since inspiration was not a mechanical dictation, the Scriptures in many ways bear the marks of their human authorship. That said, I think there is compelling evidence that “what the bible teaches” is true.


Good luck and have fun. I don’t have a recommendation for an unbiased academic history of the canon and I really don’t want to bias or influence your research (the “scholars” over at /r/academicbiblical will infamously just parrot the bias of skeptic Bart Ehrman.) So below is a starter kit from believers who are obviously bias but they do come from a diverse mix of worldviews and they do ask great questions.


From a former lesbian: Former Lesbian’s Journey to Faith Rosaria Butterfield, somewhat like you, began reading the bible to examine: textual authority, authorship, canonicity and internal hermeneutics. She states that she read the bible objectively through the rule of canonicity or: no creating canons within canons; each text gets the chance to fulfill its internal mission. The bible’s internal mission isn’t textual perfection but to change the reader.


From a former atheist: Counting to God, Douglas Ell. Former atheist Ell graduated early from MIT (double majored in math and physics), obtained a masters in theoretical mathematics from the University of Maryland and (after graduating from law school, magna cum laude) became a prominent attorney.


From a believer: The Gospel of the Lord: How the Early Church Wrote the Story of Jesus by Michael Bird, theologian and NT scholar.

This is at least partially true, we all too often explain rather than deduce. However, it also means we have reason to trust extrinsic evidence over intrinsic evidence, and demand our beliefs converge as closely as possible with the findings of science, which is name we've given to the best set of tools we've created for removing bias from our understanding.

If any religion was true, it should be increasingly convergent over time, not increasingly divergent. See also the problem of inconsistant revelations.

I'm not a Christian because no evidence has been proposed that makes Christianity exceptional, and lots has been proposed that makes it wrong in it's traditional formulations. See for example the lack of an historical Adam, which is highly damaging to the Pauline view of Christianity.

Also, the Bible is just plain wrong on the first 13 billion years of the universe, the first ~247,000 years of the human species, the first at least 47,000 years of socially modern humans, the Exodus, the conquest of Canaan, the grand united Davidic kingdom(though there was likely a local Davidic Kingdom, whose size and power are still debated as new evidence appears), and just about everything else before the 8th century BC. It's clear from textual clues the historical David was pumped up to justify the political ambitions of Josiah (who, you'll recall, "just happened" to "find" the Deuteronomic books that were "lost".) From then on it's a heavily biased book, demonizing the acts of certain rulers and glorifying others, in ways that don't seem to fit the historical record. The stories it contains condone misogyny, genocide, homophobia, slavery, etc as we should expect as the natural writings of the wisdom of desert dwellers in 8th to 4th century BC. (For more, see The Bible Unearthed, which despite being 10 years old has aged quite well. The only debated part in the journals has been just how small the Davidic kingdom is, but no one is arguing for the grand united Davidic kingdom as seen in the Bible.)

The Bible is not all bad of course, some of the writers had lofty goals like social justice and care for the poor in mind. But it certainly doesn't read like the perfect revelation of an almighty God. Most scholars would happily agree with me, and seek to increasingly mystify the Bible. (See Borg's Reading the Bible Again For the First Time for one of the better examples.)

You'll note William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga, though accomplished philosophers, both heavily lean on the "internal witness of the Holy Spirit" for their own belief. Once again, this is introspection, and devalues the religious experiences of every other religion out there.

If there were other evidence that led us to think any of this might be true, I'd be happy to go that way. But so far, I have not found any. The best argument that takes all the evidence into account is Spongs, given in Why Christianity Must Change or Die, and A New Christianity for a New World. Like many modern theologians, he has retreated into a panentheistic view of God, who is out there but outside of the reach of our understanding, and demotes all holy books to the writings of humans trying to understand this being. This at least is cogent, though once again it mostly boils down to mistaking introspection for facts.

I've written before on what it would take for me to believe, and as you'll see if you read it, it's pretty much "convergent evidence". Right now, no religion has that, and each one says they are justified based on introspection.

Science converges based on an external reality, religion diverges based on biased introspection and mutual competing claimed "revelations" that clearly aren't.

And that is in a nutshell why I'm an atheist. (At least that's what I tell myself. ;-)

(Sorry for the preaching, but it was just about the perfect setup ;-)

I would thoroughly and enthusiastically recommend the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) translation of the Bible; specifically The New Oxford Annotated Bible. It is a bible with excellent study notes and important and interesting contextual information included alongside the actual text of the Bible. I did a good amount of research when I wanted to buy a new Bible and I am confident that this is the best Bible that exists in English today. (I mean, Oxford University is a pretty well respected university, right?) If you get this Bible, you'll be sorted for any kind of Bible study. 10/10.

If you don't wish to get this one, i'd definitely still recommend the NRSV as the best English translation, unless you are under about 15 years of age, in which case you might benefit from the New Living Translation (NLT) or The Message: Remix, which is a paraphrase of the whole Bible by a guy called Eugene Peterson.

Do not trust anyone who recommends you to use the King James Version. The King James Version was created in 1611! It is over 400 years old and therefore does not benefit from the advances in scholarship over the past 4 centuries that modern translations do. On top of that, it is written in very hard to understand English comparable to Shakespearean English. Even if it were a trustworthy translation (which it most definitely is not) it would not be worth bothering with simply because of how hard it is to read.
____

Concerning which church to join, I can't really help you there by directing you to a specific place, but make sure that wherever you go does not prioritise adherence to specific doctrines over the value of community. Make sure it is always a place that allows you to ask whatever questions you like and find your own faith- not be forced to conform to someone else's conception of what it should be. Also, every Christian church needs to be active in their local community helping with the physical and emotional needs of people, not just 'preaching the gospel' as if that were all Christians are meant to. A faithful church should be making sure to provide for the needs of the poorest in its community and offer protection and acceptance for the outcasts in it's society. If a church is more focussed on telling you what you shouldn't do rather than what you should do, it probably isn't a great church.

____

If you are just new to Christianity (or even if you're not) please feel free to private message me and we can chat about any questions or whatever you might have and I can share with you whatever wisdom I might have. :D

Peace :)

I've been thinking about this. The works which first pop to mind are probably too technical for general interest as they are written to be read by other professional philosophers. I'm trying to think of what might be interest to the educated person who isn't a Philosophy major.
*****

Peter Kreeft

Peter Kreeft writes a lot of things for a general audience. He is a Catholic philosopher at Boston College. He often speaks at other universities, and has even been part of a debate with a former professor of mine, so he is at least pretty well-known in philosophical circles. He has a bunch of free readings on the "featured readings" and "more featured readings" pages of his site, which also has lectures and such. Here is his author page on Amazon. His books are also mostly intended for a general audience. I've read a handful of them, so if you're thinking of ordering one, or finding it at a library, let me know and I'll give you my two cents. The Sea Within: Waves and the Meaning of All Things is interesting. He is fairly old, and a lifelong surfer. In that book he draws analogies between the natural pull the ocean has on us and the pull God has on us. He also has many Socrates Meets... books which don't have so much to do with religion, but provide accessible introductions to various philosophers (e.g. Socrates Meets Sartre).
*****

Alvin Plantinga

Alvin Plantinga is a very prominent philosopher, and a Christian. Much of his writing is intended for the professional philosophical audience, but some if it might be accessible to a general audience. Here is his Amazon author page. Let me know if you're thinking about checking out any of his stuff. Like I said, a lot of it is more technical than Kreeft's. Also, he is in the analytic tradition, whereas Kreeft is more in the continental tradition. I think that further distances him from the casual reader.

Some of Plantinga's works which might be good:

• God and Other Minds: A Study of the Rational Justification of Belief in God is pretty much what it's long title says.
  
  
• I see a brand new book, which I might get myself! It's on a topic which often comes up in this very forum, science and religion. (Anybody want to read it with me?!) Where the Conflict Really Lies: Science, Religion, and Naturalism. Publisher's blurb:
  
  >This book is a long-awaited major statement by a pre-eminent analytic philosopher, Alvin Plantinga, on one of our biggest debates -- the compatibility of science and religion. The last twenty years has seen a cottage industry of books on this divide, but with little consensus emerging. Plantinga, as a top philosopher but also a proponent of the rationality of religious belief, has a unique contribution to make. His theme in this short book is that the conflict between science and theistic religion is actually superficial, and that at a deeper level they are in concord.
  
  *****
  

  Søren Kierkegaard
  

  
  If you're thinking more historically, I think Kierkegaard can be very interesting. He is considered by many to be a proto-existentialist (a sort of existentialist before existentialism existed as a movement). Fear and Trembling is relatively easy to read, short, and probably his most read work. I recommend it. Also, here is his Amazon author page.
  
  *****
  

  Others
  

  
  Those three were just a few of the many Christian philosophers I find interesting. There are a whole lot more, some more accessible than others to a general audience. This is still just a fraction of the historical Christian philosophical scene, but I think it will give you a good start. These are all of them off of the top of my head whom I have studied to some extent.
  
  

  Contemporary:
  

  
  

• John Hick (Amazon) (Website) (Wiki): Primarily a philosopher of religion and theologian, comes from a rather liberal, mystic Christian perspective.
  
  
• Bas van Fraassen (Wiki): Doesn't actually do much on religion, just a prominent philosopher who happens to be a theist. In fact, many would not guess him to be a theist due to his ultra-empiricism.
  
  
• Peter van Inwagen (Wiki): A prominent philosopher in both philosophy of religion, and other areas. Some would argue he's even a better philosopher than Plantinga (heresy among some Christian philosophers, lol).
  
  
• J.P. Moreland (Wiki): Christian philosopher, does a lot of apologetics.
  
  
• William Lane Craig (Wiki): Well-known, but not well-liked by many philosophers, does a lot of apologetics and travels the world doing public debates with atheists. Has also done a good deal of publishing.
  
  
• Cornell West (Wiki): Awesome guy!
  
  
• Richard Swinburne: (Wiki) (Amazon Author Page): Has written many books more geared towards a general audience I believe.
  
  

  Historical
  

  
  

• Francis of Assisi
  
  
• Augustine of Hippo
  
  
• Peter Abelard
  
  
• Thomas Aquinas
  
  
• Renee Descartes
  
  
• John Locke
  
  
• George Berkeley
  
  
• Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
  
  
• Blaise Pascal
  
  
• Johann Gotlieb Fichte
  
  
• Immanuel Kant
  
  
• William James: One badass mo'fo in my humble opinion. Early twentieth century American philosopher, part of the pragmatist school, and a defender of faith.
  
  ****
  Author's Note: I've been working on this entry for about 45 minutes now. I hope someone reads some of it. Time for a break. If you have any questions, or wanna talk philosophy, let me know, it's in my blood.*
  
  

Hi Friend,

As simple as it sounds, I deal with it by trusting in the Lord. I know that God has promised that heaven will be better than any of us can imagine, and because God is all powerful, omniscient, and omni-benevolent (among many other attributes) I know that what he has in store for me is good and only good. There are some things that we'll never know, but what we do know, based on NDEs, is that heaven is beyond incredible and human words can't properly convey it. Imagine Heaven by John Burke is an excellent read on this topic.

I think questioning heaven, if you believe, is a deception of Satan. I've done it too, but I know that God is good and faithful so there is no reason to put anyone else's words above God's word.

If you want satisfactory reasons to believe, there are many. My strongest reason is personal experiences with pursuing a relationship with Jesus. However, if you doubt the scripture or existence of God, perhaps these sources will help (this is a format that I prefer):

The Reliability of the New Testament

The Resurrection of Jesus

If you search around on that channel, there are several arguments for God's existence too. A simple google search can pull up the arguments too.

Regardless of what you believe, you can find satisfactory reasons for your beliefs (especially if you're not well-read about counterarguments/points on the other side)

I used to have chronic existential depression with bouts of strong suicidal thoughts, which I believe would have lead to action eventually. It didn't happen overnight, but getting to know and love God has cured me of my biggest problem in life - a lack of objective meaning/purpose. I tried everything that people say about finding your own meaning, it just didn't work. If it did, everyone would be fulfilled and happy.

I also just finished a book called Purpose Driven Life, which has been very helpful in understanding God's purpose for my life. He created us to love us and have a relationship with us.

I hope some of this has been helpful.

With love,

GlorySpren

Seems to me you are already at step 1: desiring a relationship with God. Prayer is a great place to go next. Praying can be as simple as talking to God. Reading the Bible can also be a form of prayer! Want a place to start? Look up what today's readings are in a church calendar, and pray about them.

You may feel more comfortable following a more structured style of meditation, such as praying the Rosary to meditate on the life of Jesus.

Also, I don't know if it is Sunday where you are or if there is a church near you with a mass today, but I recommend making one if you can. There may be one in your area you can make weekdays in addition to Sundays, or you can try to go next Sunday and the following Sundays.

Read about the lives of the Saints! Some of them have gone through a great deal, you are not alone. Their lives are full of inspiration and demonstrate how the Holy Spirit works through us. I recommend the Laudate and IBreviary apps. (Former has many things including saint of the day and interactive Rosary, later has the Liturgy of the Hours.)

There is a wealth of Christian philosophy and in general philosophy is interesting and useful so I will also recommend a bunch of philosophy. I also recommend this introductory guide to Aquinas. Lastly, I will pray for you. I hope this was useful to you. God Bless!

I highly recommend Marcus Borg's Reading the Bible Again for the First Time: Taking the Bible Seriously but not Literally. This is a fantastic place to begin to understand the way that those of us who do not read the Bible literally approach the text.

Another good help for you might be Timothy Bael's Biblical Literacy: The Essential Bible Stories Everyone Needs to Know. It is very 101, but fantastic for someone who has never really read their Bible. You'll find Bael's introductory chapters helpful in getting your head around what the text is and how it ought to be understood in a very general sense. Then, Bael goes on to introduce you to individual biblical stories, book by book, raising questions and pointing out ways in which each story has influenced our culture. Note that Bael raises questions, he doesn't often offer answers. That is sort of the point. It's your job to wrestle with the text--he just helps you ask questions you might not have thought of.

> If you view the more fantastic stories such as the creation as a metaphor, why can't all of it be metaphorical? How do you choose what's literal and what isn't?

It would really depend on the individual story, book, letter, or poem you're talking about. The Bible isn't a "book" in the sense that we usually think of books. The Bible is a library of many different forms of literature, written for different purposes, by different people, in different cultures, and to different audiences. All of these factors weigh in on how you understand the text.

There are further questions about what the Bible even is in a theological sense, and then how the Bible ought to be used and interpreted in Christian communities. As far as this goes, I greatly value what N.T. Wright has to offer in Scripture and the Authority of God: How to Read the Bible Today and what Dale Martin has to offer in the opening chapter of Sex and the Single Savior: Gender and Sexuality in the Bible. I'm honestly not sure if either of those last two books would be remotely helpful for you.

I definitely, definitely recommend the first two though, if you can afford it.

You should definitely stay in the faith. From what you've said you're the ideal person to be a Christian. Jesus came to save sinners, not the perfect. If you feel like you don't pray enough, remind yourself that there's no gold star for praying, and that God never says he'll punish anyone for not praying enough. You're right that being a Christian isn't always easy, but it really is worth it. And yes, it can be difficult, but it's also freedom and true life. I know personally that feeling like a hypocrite sucks, but it's worth staying with it. I went through about 5 years of flirting with atheism and feeling trapped but I'm so glad I stayed. There are answers to your doubts, very good ones. But it can take a bit of searching to find good ones.

Re. Reading the Bible, I think your instinct to be careful in your interpretation is really helpful, but that doesn't mean the only options you have is reading everything as 100% literal (as in, this is what I would've seen if someone was there with a camera) on the one hand, and 100% allegorical (as in, this is kind of like Lord of the Rings in that it makes a nice point but is really just fantasy) on the other.

If you're thinking of Genesis in particular, there's a long history of reading it as not necessarily referring to 6 literal 24hr days (for example St Augustine). [The lost world of Genesis 1] (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0830837043?ie=UTF8&tag=thebiofou06-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0830837043) by John Walton is a good place to start if you want to understand the way in which Genesis fits its Ancient Near Eastern context.

On the bigger topic of archaeology, slavery, what's the point of Genesis, why is the OT so wierd, is there a way between literalism and allegoricalism? etc. Inspiration and Incarnation
by Peter Enns is by far the most helpful thing I've read.


TL:DR
Keep going! Read Atheist Delusions, The Lost world of Genesis 1 and, Inspiration and Incarnation. Don't give up, there's plenty of really good answers out there. Christianity is life and freedom. You may not feel it now but the more you look into it, the more you'll see it. At least, that's my experience.

God bless you! :) I love how you have shared your testimony.

I'm a young Christian guy and, unfortunately, struggle with porn and masturbation as well. So I do relate to your troubles there.

As someone who is new to the Christian faith, you might find this book REALLY helpful:

https://www.amazon.com/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473987989&sr=8-1&keywords=mere+christianity

It is called "Mere Christianity" by C.S Lewis, who, fun fact, is also the auther of the "Chronicals of Narnia" fiction series.

C.S Lewis was a devout Christian and has wrote many great books on the Christian faith. I would also reccomend his book "the Screwtape Letters" which is a book about demons. And it might help you with temptation, as you shall realise the spiritual reality of what happens whan you go through that tempation.

You also mentioned that your parents are Catholic, so they might appreciate that you learn Theology from the renowned Theologian,

Thomas Aquinas: https://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Aquinas-Selected-Writings-Classics/dp/0140436324/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473988742&sr=1-1&keywords=thomas+aquinas

https://www.amazon.com/Aquinass-Shorter-Summa-Thomass-Theologica/dp/1928832431/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989822&sr=1-7&keywords=thomas+aquinas

https://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Aquinas-50-Pages-Laymans/dp/0988442515/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989867&sr=1-3&keywords=thomism

https://www.amazon.com/Aquinas-Beginners-Guide-Edward-Feser/dp/1851686908/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989924&sr=1-6&keywords=thomism

Thomos Aquinas is not only one of the greatest philosophers of Christianity, but one of the greatest philosophers PERIOD.

Just by reading, you can really learn a lot about the nature of God, what it means to

pray, how to properly interpret Scripture, understanding your

sexuality, the proper use of meditation etc.

Just reading one book can inform you a LOT.

I say this because, a lot of times, new Christians ask how or where

they can learn more about Christianity. Which is funny because the

answer is right in front of them. :) You learn more about religion

just as you learn more about everything else iln life. Through books.

)

Anyways. God bless you in your newfound relationship with Him.
May you grow in faith and find righteous abstinence from sin.
Pray for me as I shall pray for you.

Deo Gratias! +++

Since you asked for book recommendations in the other thread, I'll point to three books:

This book has to do with Christianity and Science. It's Where the Conflict Really Lies by Alvin Plantiga. Plantiga is a very well respected analytic philosopher and is also a Christian. This is his most recent book and it's gotten great reviews. It deals with topics like evolution and also responds to questions such as Could God be a mental projection? and such (granted that topic is an entire book in itself but he talk about that possibility.).

The Problem of Evil by Peter Van Inwaged. I have heard this is a great book, check out the reviews on amazon if you want more.

Lastly, I would like to point to is Greg Boyd's book The benefit of doubt. I suspect this could be an especially informative book for you, since it discusses faith and reason.

Greg Boyd also wrote a book on the question of evil in the bible.

I also highly recommend the Unbelievable Podcast. This podcast features Atheist philosophers and Christian theologians sitting down and talking to others about their disagreements and agreements and other issues involving their faith. You will probably find some answers to your questions from that podcast.

http://www.premierchristianradio.com/Shows/Saturday/Unbelievable?

Lastly, you already have a lot of reading on your plate but Richard Swinburne, a well respected philosopher of religion wrote a trilology called The Coherence of Theism, The Existence of God, and Faith and Reason. You would do well to check that series out.

In general, I have found that every objection to the Christian faith has been responded to. Responded to does not necessarily mean answered and "solved". For many of the big problems, there are no easy, clear cut answers. But someone has looked at them and attempted an answer and ultimately, it's up to you to decide within yourself, if those answers are good enough to continue to have faith.

Please be patient and most importantly take your time as you sift through your considerations. Thinking about the philosophy of religion can be quite consuming.

Happy journying!

The necessary step to rejoining the Church in a juridical sense is to make a good confession. Start by reflecting on how you've lived since your teenage years with the aid of an examination of conscience. There is a good one published as a pamphlet by the Fathers of Mercy. When you are ready, do not feel limited to the regularly scheduled hours for confession. You can always call the rectory and ask for a priest to meet you in the confessional at a certain time.

A good reintroduction to the content of the faith is Father John Hardon's book The Catholic Catechism. It should refresh your memory of any important tenets of the faith you have forgotten, or were never taught. On the other hand, if you pretty well remember all the fundamentals of the faith and are asking how to learn more in a deeper sense, I recommend diving into the ancient writings of the Church Fathers. Two good books to start with are Augustine's Confessions and Athanasius' On the Incarnation.

For rekindling personal spiritual practice, Met. Anthony Bloom's book Beginning to Pray is a great book. And St Louis de Montfort's book The Secret of the Rosary is a good one on how to get the most out of a devotion commended to us by many great saints.

>JWs have little in common with the teachings of Arius.

The heresy that Arius was guilty of was teaching that Jesus was a created being, that was subordinate in time to the Father. JWs teach that Jesus was the Archangel Michael, a created being, and are therefore guilty of the same heresy.

>The council of Nicaea brought the false teaching of the trinity doctrine.

The doctrine of the Trinity is easily recognizable in scripture if one reads what is actually written rather than deciding that they know better and just changing it. If you do some reading on the first ecumenical councils, the context in which they occurred, and what they were a response to, I think you'll find that their doctrinal determinations were appropriate and necessary to prevent further heretical teachings. I'd suggest The Story of Christianity Vol 1. The view that JWs and Mormons hold of the creeds and the ecumenical councils don't make any sense historically and only exist to reinforce non-biblical theology.

>Eventually other false teachings such as "Mary the Mother of God" crept into Christianity, none of which our first century brothers and sisters ever did.

Agree that the Marian doctrines are false, which is why I'm not a Catholic. The Reformation was an adequate response to that problem. The fact that later heresies crept into the church does not mean that the early creeds are incorrect. You'd have to actually prove that.

>Willing to change a teaching if found to be improper or unsupported by the scriptures.

Except you've re-written the scriptures to support your position and don't accept other translations as valid. That's not a good faith position, that's stacking the deck.

>Psalm 36 says Jehovah is the source of life. Jesus certainly is the way and the truth and the life. Jesus having been taught by his Father. Jehovah is the God who sent the light (truth) into the world that we might be saved.

Read what you wrote and then read Jesus' statement again. You're having to equivocate to minimize what Jesus actually calls himself in order to fit it into your theology. This is no different than when Mormons qualify God's role to being "just the God of this earth." They have to read their belief back into the text, which is exactly what you're doing here.

>Jesus quotes Psalm 82:6 which in its entirety says... “I have said, ‘You are gods, All of you are sons of the Most High. Yes, Psalm 82 is about the unjust judges of Israel. Is Jesus unjust? No. He is the Son of the "Most High God". Psalm 83:18 tells us that Jehovah (YHWH יהוה) is "The Most High God". Moses said at Deuteronomy 18:15... Jehovah your God will raise up for you from among your brothers a prophet like me. You must listen to him. The Apostle Peter confirms that this prophet was Jesus at Acts 3:22.

This doesn't remotely address my issue with how you mishandled Jesus' application of this scripture. Jesus is calling the Jews who are persecuting him unjust judges. When God is describing the judges as gods in Psalm 82, he's mocking them. Please address the issue rather than drowning it in unrelated tangents.

>The scripture never says that Jehovah "The Most High God" would become flesh.

Sure hints at it though. Emmanuel means "God with us." That a person named Emmanuel would be also be called "Wonderful, Mighty, Counsellor, and everlasting Father is what we colloquially refer to as a clue :)

>God can not die.

The eternal, unchanging, singular substance that is Yahweh? Agreed. The incarnation of that being into human flesh? That's what all of Paul's theology and Jesus' application of the tetragrammaton to himself "Before Abraham was, I AM." is pointing to. I trust them before I trust the Watchtower society.

>He sent his only-begotten son in our behalf. Jesus as an obedient son (Hebrews 5:5)

Hebrews 5 is about the role of the High Priest and the function of that role in atoning for the sins of the people. The argument in this passage is that Jesus, as the Son, is both High Priest forever, negating the need for any other intercessor, and the God to whom reconciliation must be made. He is both the priest entering the tabernacle when God traveled with Israel, and God dwelling in that tabernacle. Or, going back to the name Emmanuel and the notion of atonement being a healing of the rift between Creator and creature, God with us, at last.

>is accomplishing all the work his Father gave him to do (John 4:34).

John 4 is about Jesus establishing the importance of His mission. Building the kingdom, which he explicitly instructs the disciples to do when he tells them immediately after this that He sent them to reap, now, that for which they did not labor, is more important than anything of this world. The context in which he is explaining this is an opportunity to explain the condescension He's subjected himself to in order to bring about the Kingdom.

>John clears this debate with his words at Revelation 19:13 where Jesus is given the title "The Word of God".

How do read that as the assignment of a title? In context we're told that "he has a name that no one knows but himself" and is called instead "The Word of God." That treatment of the Name is identical to how the Israelites treated יְהוָֹה. They wouldn't say YHWH, they would say Adonai as a placeholder. Ask any Hebrew speaker today to read you the Shema, which is the most important prayer in Judaism, and they'll render it as; Shema Israel. Adonai eloheynu , Adonai ehud! "Hear, o Israel. The Lord our God (interestingly, the plural form) the Lord is one!" Even in their most important prayer, the Name is too sacred too utter.

>The personal name of the Almighty God Jehovah (YHWH יהוה) occurs in the scriptures around 7,000 times. As far as I'm concerned, every bible that has removed his name from their pages has 7,000 + mistakes.

See my comment above about the name of God. יהוה is unpronounceable in Biblical Hebrew (no vowels) and is verbalized as Adonai or Ha Shem (the Name) The closest word to these in Koine Greek is κύριος which we render as LORD in deference to the reverent handling of God's name. All those places the NWT is replacing יהוה with Jehovah are a) mocking the relationship between God and Israel, and b) doing nothing more than any other translation is doing with the word LORD, you just have less linguistic justification for it.


>Your version of John 1:1 contradicts itself and verse 2. The Word can not be with God and be God.

That's the point John is making. This is an explicit reference to the Trinity. More importantly, in every document scrap we find of John 1, from either the Alexandrian or Byzantine text types, the rendering is the same. So either you have to argue that John wrote it down wrong, or that it means something that couldn't be understood in the context of 2nd temple Jewish ideas of the nature of God. Given the reaction that the Pharisees have to Jesus when he applies the Tetragrammaton to himself later in John and, given that this is a Gospel, the purpose of which is to proclaim the coming of the Kingdom and the atonement to all mankind, it seems fairly self evident that John chose his words carefully. Especially in light of [John 1:3] where John ascribes the entirety of creation to the Word. Or [John 1:4] where he uses the language you'd referenced in Psalm 36 to attribute to Jesus what David had attributed to God alone. John pretty clearly means to indicate that the Word is YHWH.

>The created Jesus was made both Lord and Christ by God (Acts 2:36)

Lord here is κύριος, the same as every rendering of יהוה in the Septuagint. And Peter is clearly playing with the wording as he cites Psalm 110:1, with the church reacting in horror as they realized that God Himself was crucified. Remember, these were people who had all witnessed the resurrected Christ, so their reaction to this declaration is not to the idea that the Messiah had been crucified, but that the Lord had been. So horrified that all 3000 of them were baptized and repented immediately after the sermon.

You'll notice that for every scripture reference you've used there's a perfectly (I know you'll disagree) valid way to exegete the text without adding anything to it. Every verse, understood in context, does something other than what you think it's doing when you use it as a prooftext. If JW scholarship were done on the basis of what the text actually says, we'd have more common ground, but you simply can't get to the conclusions you reach without wholesale changes to the meaning of words and attributing meaning that can't be read from the text itself.

u/versebot

>I’m genuinely confused, how is your faith in the bible different than cult members’ faith in their cult leaders’ words?

The difference between the Bible and a cult leader's words are pretty substantial.

• The Bible is a compilation of works which require a lifetime of learning, reflection, and discussion in order to contemplate their meaning. Its substance and weight dwarfs that of the average cult leader's flimsy theology.
  
  
• The Bible has an incredibly rich and historical literary tradition going back thousands of years. It is easily the most important book to exist in the West. The fact that the West's most significant and genius philosophers, teachers, historians, and authors held the Christian faith as central to their lives lends at least some veracity to the Bible's intellectual and historical substance.
  
  A charismatic preacher such as a cult leader has little but his words to legitimize himself. Thousands of books and letters have not been written around the People's Temple. There is no systematic and epistemological study of the vast majority of cults that matches that of Christianity or even the other major religions on Earth. Even most academics who are atheists and are not being completely uncharitable will agree with this.
  
  >Also, what is the single philosophical argument you find most impactful to your conversion?
  
  The Five Ways by Aquinas are good. But their function is not to convince people that God exists as much as it is to establish a foundation for the rest of Aquinas's theology. If you want a good book on the "essence" of what God is I would suggest this book.
  
  But honestly, the people who become convinced of God's existence are not those who read a philosophical proof and then believed. Speaking from the experience of my most intelligent friends, belief in God comes from the most unexpected places. One of my friends came to believe while reading a passage from Dante's Inferno. Another came to believe while going to the March for Life with their fiance. And there is another friend who realized they believed while arguing with someone over the existence of universal morality.
  
  My point is that belief in God does not come from reading a single philosophical or historical text. Rather, it appears from a complex blend of life experience, knowledge, and reflection. It is a long process that even the person himself may not notice until they find themselves at the cusp of believing. Another way of thinking about it is this: a war is often not won due to a grand battle; a war is won because of the many hundreds of skirmishes across many battlefields and points.

The 4-source theory (or the Documentary Hypothesis) holds that Genesis (along with the rest of the Pentateuch [First 5 books of the Bible]) were written by 4 different authors, and later compiled into the book that we have.

The 4 sources are JEDP, J is the Jahwist, E is the Elohimist, D is the Deuteronomist, P is the Priestly Source.

I'm assuming you're writing about the flood narrative in Genesis, which is generally accepted to be a Jahwist text, thought to be written around 950 B.C.E.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis

Use this to get legitimate sources.


There's also the traditional belief that Moses wrote the book of Genesis, which would place it at about 1250 B.C.E., but nobody really puts a whole lot of stock in that anymore.

Personally, I don't particularly buy the 4-source theory as it stands, as it seems to be an unnecessary explanation. It seems to me that the Pentateuch is a collection of Ancient Near Eastern myths compiled by one author, probably around 500 B.C.E. That's probably why you have some similarities with works like Gilgamesh and the Enuma Elish, because they all draw from the same oral traditions.

Anyways, I would look for sources on Wikipedia. Your best bet for good, solid information is on the documentary hypothesis. Let me know if you have any other questions, I'll see what i can do to help.

EDIT: Richard Friedman might be a good source. He has a few books that are accessible to the layperson. Particularly Who Wrote the Bible?.

I'd also recommend a few commentaries on Genesis. The best one I've read is the JPS Torah Commentary on Genesis by Dr. Nahum M. Sarna. It's got a lot of Hebrew stuff in it, but you can still get some good information about the Jewish interpretation of Genesis.

Good Luck.

Maybe I'm crazy, but Simply Christian by N.T. Wright is, in my opinion, a beautifully composed book explaining the Christian faith. It's in the same vein as C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity in that Wright doesn't deal with anything denominational. He merely explains why we Christians have become so and the beauty of the beliefs that comprise the core of our faith.

Here's a link to it on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Simply-Christian-Christianity-Makes-Sense/dp/0061920622/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374349814&sr=8-1&keywords=simply+christian

It's a pretty short read, especially because the language and style are simple.

I hope that all works out for you and your girlfriend for the glory of God's Kingdom, man.

P.S. He also expounds on three different lenses through which to view God's relation to the world. The first two he is trying to refute, them being pantheism/panentheism and dualism. The third, which he propones as more accurate to the Christian/Judaic faiths, is that Heaven and Earth are not the same, as the pantheist might posit, or that they are completey separate (so says the dualist), but that they are somehow closely intertwined. Anyways, I like this book. You should check it out even for yourself.

Dreams can certainly be used to get our attention. In your case since there is no one in your family that is Jehovah's Witness, I would think it is just more of a question of is there any price you can put on salvation? Would you be willing to give up something so valuable as your soul for money? These are questions all of us have had to grapple with. Often some of us have even been tested. It should be encouraging to you that you were able to deny such temptation when faced with it. Not everyone would be able to. ;)

When my husband and I were first married we did not have much money. He was offered a job making twice what he was making at the time. It seemed like a great thing and I was so excited. He prayed about it but did not feel peace about the job. I was very sad and almost depressed and even angry. But my husband said that we needed to trust God and that He had a plan and that He sees the "big picture." We later found out that the job he would have gotten would have been with a boss that was really difficult to work under, as he met other people that worked at the college. Also, within a few months my husband was offered another job that was even higher pay and it opened doors down the road that were great for his career. I learned a valuable lesson during that season. I humbly admit that I had a much harder time saying "no" to something when tempted with the right price, unfortunately.


Also, why are you so skeptical about stories of people dying and coming back to life? I find stories about near death experiences to be incredibly encouraging and faith building. I just read a fantastic book last week called "Imagine Heaven" by John Burke that is about these experience and he did a great job of tying in scripture throughout the book. After reading it I have a greater feeling of peace regardless of what happens in this life. Knowing God has a plan and we can trust Him is such a comforting thing, even in death as the stories all show. Here is a link if you are interested, or for your dad since he seems to like this sort of thing: http://www.amazon.com/Imagine-Heaven-Near-Death-Experiences-Exhilarating/dp/080101526X Or the video series the pastor did on the same subject https://vimeo.com/140585737

First, I think it would be an excellent idea to contact your chaplain friend about what you are thinking. It starts with relationships, and you have one there ready-made to leverage.

Second, start perhaps just by "belonging" to a place. Find a Anglican community nearby and just start going. Then, DO something with them. If they have a ministry in the community somewhere, just pitch in. Belief is the work of a lifetime, and it is the consequence of relationships and doing... belief is the LAST thing to come... not the first. If that sounds a little strange, here's an article at my Parish's website titled "I've never even BEEN in a church..." that might clarify what I mean by this: http://www.stjamesnl.org/ I know that's not your particular case, but you ARE approaching faith for the first time as an adult... and it will seem like you are starting right from the beginning.

One of the exciting things I discovered in my own, very similar journey, was that God turns out to be "fractal", rich, and immensely interesting... so very different than the God I thought I understood as a child.

A book I would recommend for you is Simply Christian by NT Wright. Wright is the author of dozens of scholarly and popular books on Christianity (and is a CoE Bishop (ret)). His work is immanently readable. It may help you to frame things up. http://www.amazon.com/Simply-Christian-Christianity-Makes-Sense/dp/0061920622

Happy to help if I can...

Ron

> I'm not attending at the moment nor have I in quite some time.

Well, obviously, everybody is going to say you should fix that! Maybe try out several different churches, so you can find the best place, and maybe you'll feel like you've chosen it on your own, instead of just following along with family or whatever (even if you end up at the same church as before).

>I've read the occasional scripture but not recently. I am in the market for my own bible (never owned my own though).

You should read a gospel or two, and a nice Epistle. How about my favorite synoptic, Matthew. Then read John, and then Romans or 1and2 Corinthians. There are several good Bible translations available now. The most popular ones for this subreddit are the NRSV and ESV, and then maybe the NABRE. I've got this Bible; it's a good translation and it has tons of notes.

>No books.

Just about everybody likes CS Lewis. NT Wright's stuff is very good.

>I guess I'm wondering if it is odd to feel so lost?

I don't think so, I think it happens to most people. It's good that your family kept you in church, but at some point you've got to take over the task yourself, and often you don't know what you need to know. You should be trying to fix it, but it sounds like you've started that task, so I'd just keep at it, and don't worry about it.

> I come from a very rural area of England but in my town alone we have an Anglican (High Church) church, a Catholic church, a Methodist church, a Baptist church, an Eastern Orthodox church, potentially some others I do not know about, and also there is a society of friends here.

Why not visit them all?

> However Works of Mercy are also an important part of the Catholic Church, so that point alone doesn't really help me decide, even though to me it's important that I am involved with a church which values Works of Mercy.

Works of Mercy should be something all Christians agree is important!

> The biggest issue in choosing which church to go to is that because I was not brought up religious at all and my family are so anti-religious I really don't know much about it, and have not explored my faith at all with anyone else so don't really know how I stand on a lot of the important divides between the denominations.

I suppose step one is learning what all these different groups teach, then. This is a surprisingly good introduction. For something more in depth, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years is very good. If you really want to go in depth, A History of Doctrine (this is volume one of five) is pretty much comprehensive.

Of course, you shouldn't just sit in your house reading books. Get up and go visit all those churches you've mentioned. Speak with the priest/pastor/minister and ask them your questions about their church and it's teachings!

Join a Christian community and read the Bible. You do not need to read the Bible from beginning to end, it's okay to start in the middle because the Bible is an anthology. Most Christians recommend starting at the Gospels in the New Testament because those witness to the significance of Jesus' identity. The Bible is best read with others, in conversation and community.

Oh yeah, and Jesus. If there is anything at the center of Christianity, it is that Jesus shows us what God is like. We believe God's character is marked by a terribly deep and unfathomable love. Christians believe that God wishes to transform the world and human relationships through Jesus' life, death, and resurrection.

Two accessible introductions to Christianity I really enjoy are by Rowan Williams: Being Christian and Tokens of Trust. The first book introduces Christianity through four key practices of Christians, and the second book introduces Christianity through an popular statement of belief called the Apostles' Creed. So I think they're complementary because one focuses on practices and the other focuses on beliefs.

John Stott's Basic Christianity and NT Wright's Simply Christian are also very good.

Sorry that I'm throwing a billion books at you. Best of luck in this journey.

"One God in three Persons" is the classic description.

Beyond casual conversations, this question is actually a really fascinating study for historians of early Christianity.

Second-Temple-era Jews were fiercely monotheistic; unlike the henotheism of pre-Exile Israel, in the centuries just before Christ to be a Jew of any sect was first to be a monotheist.

Yet in the earliest Christian writings, from the first century, mostly written well before the canonical Gospels, the Christians describe themselves praying in Jesus' name; practicing devotion to Him personally by name, performing exorcisms in His name, and expecting to be resurrected and glorified in Him.

Larry Hurtado's excellent book Lord Jesus Christ is written to examine the question of how first-century Jews were able to accommodate within their idea of monotheism both "one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we live," worshiping both yet not seeing themselves as polytheists. He approaches the question primarily by reading how Christians write to one another about themselves and their worship, rather than their preaching to the non Christian world - what did first-century Christians consider normal?.

Along with early Christian writings, Hurtado also spends some time on popular religion of first-century Judea, which (unlike the Pharisaic expectation of a Davidic messiah-king) emphasized the role of Adam in man's fall, and expected the glorification of "the son of man," who would be exalted to the throne of God. (He might be Seth, Noah, Enoch, Moses... the apocalypses vary.) Paul shows the influence of this pervasive spiritual environment in his repeated comparisons of Christ and Adam, while Jesus refers to Himself more often as "the son of man" than as "I."

The book is about five years old so it ought to be in your local library - or just pick it up at Amazon. (The fact that there aren't any cheap used copies listed for sale tells you that people who've bought it consider it a keeper.)

I grew up Baptist but became an atheist when I was 17. After 20 years I came back this summer. One thing that really helped me was the new Testament scholar N.T. Wright, he has a book, Simply Christian which I will recommend:
https://www.amazon.com/Simply-Christian-Christianity-Makes-Sense/dp/0061920622

He has a lot of lectures on youtube and the like, easy to google and also commentaries on various books of the New Testament. If you aren't used to reading the Bible it might help to have a commentary to help with the many things that can seem unfamiliar or strange to a modern reader.

I agree with the earlier poster who warned about the King James. The King James is a beautiful translation and a foundational work of english literature but might be a poor choice for a modern reader seeking to understand content. For that I might go with one of the various 'RSV' translations like RSV, NRSV, ESV, RSV-CE, RSV-2CE etc.

Another thing that is helpful is what is called the 'lectionary' which is basically the Bible broken up into readings throughout the church year on a three year cycle. It is easy to follow along on a daily basis and helps get you into sort of a pattern. The lectionary is used by many churches, Roman Catholic, Episcopal/Anglican, Lutheran, some Methodist and Presbyterian, etc.
Daily reading: http://www.dailylectio.net
Full lectionary: http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/
There are also lectionary apps for your phone.
Also if you decide toattend mass/service at a church that uses the lectionary you will basically be following along.

I find reading the Bible every day and praying does change you, maybe in ways you won't expect.

>To me, the most obvious explanation for why you don't think Genesis should be taken literally is that you understand that it can't be literally true and so you conclude that it wasn't intended to be so. On the other hand, you want to believe in Jesus and the gospels, so you believe that they're true, and then decide that they must have been written as truth. If this isn't the reason for your position, then please tell me what your actual reason is.

Could you be a little more condescending here? How is this the "most obvious explanation"? This is the most obvious explanation if you take me to be an idiot or intellectually dishonest; I do not appreciate those implications. Charity will ensure that our discussions are fruitful.

If we are going to interpret the Bible, then we must discern how different genres should be interpreted. The Bible has a plethora of different genres: narrative, poetry, song, genealogy, letters, apocalypse, law, prophecy, etc. We need to understand the nature of these genres so we can read them right. Otherwise, we are going to produce absurd ideas. For example, if we read the newspaper thinking that it's a love poem, we will probably become frustrated.

Genesis 1 has a lot of poetic elements to it. It is a story of how God created the universe and assigned function to everything. It should not be difficult to see the poetic nature of this chapter. For example, Days 1-3 depict God creating various containers; Days 4-6 depict God filling the containers. On Day 4, he creates sun, moon, and stars, which corresponds to Day 1 - light and dark. Day 5 has fish and birds which fill the sky and sea (Day 2). Day 6 is plant and animal life and humans, which fills the land made on Day 3.

Anyway, the story is much more a story about God than about the mechanics of creation. It is not a historical narrative. Thus, trying to interpret this like we would a historical narrative is an unfortunate category mistake. I've found John Walton's The Lost World of Genesis One to be a helpful deconstruction of this chapter.

Now, the Gospels are a different genre. They are biographies of Jesus Christ, and they focus on what he did. These are quite similar to other, secular biographies that we have from the same time period. Furthermore, fiction from that time is not written like the Gospels. The Gospels demonstrate eyewitness sources. To say that they were not to be intended as actual history is to say that the writers effectively invented a brand-new genre of realistic fiction. Mythic writings in this time were not like the Gospels. For example, contrast the Revelation or 1 Enoch (apocalyptic literature) with the Gospels. One should easily be able to tell the difference.

The point is, we should realize that the Bible has different genres, was written over the course of hundreds of years, and is a diverse document. As it sounds silly to question if the epistles were written to actual people because the Psalms are worship music, the idea that Genesis 1 is not intended to be historical implies nothing about the historicity of the Gospels. If you are interesting in a full understanding of the different texts, I would recommend Fee/Stuart's How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth, and How to Read the Bible Book by Book. They are helpful introductions to the topic of Biblical Intepretation.

I'd reccomend that you ask that question over at r/Orthodoxchristianity.

I'm a pretty recent convert to Orthodoxy and Christanity so you'd get better responses from more well read people than myself.

On the Incarnation by st. Athanasius is one I would reccomend to think about the incarnated Christ, but that isn't necessarily focused on that specific part of his work and ministry.

https://www.amazon.com/Incarnation-Saint-Athanasius-Popular-Patristics/dp/0881414271/ref=asc_df_0881414271/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312025907670&hvpos=1o2&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8053380684652781832&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9019552&hvtargid=pla-494160369835&psc=1

The best thing that comes to my mind specifically with regards to your question is the Divine Liturgy of st. Basil the Great written for Great and Holy Saturday (The Lord's Sabbath). Here is a portion of it.


https://imgur.com/a/O1RnMnB

https://imgur.com/a/iAGOarn

https://imgur.com/a/YVw7rVz

https://svspress.com/great-and-holy-saturday/

I can recommend some books.

For general theology:

• Being, Consciousness, and Bliss by David Bentley Hart
  
  
• On the Divine Names by Pseudo-Dionysius
  
  
• This argument and this other argument, which are some of the best out there for God's existence
  
  
• Summa Theologica by Aquinas
  
  
• The Last Superstition by Ed Fesser
  
  For living a Christian life:
  
  
• Way of the Pilgram
  
• The Life of Moses by Gregory of Nyssa
  
• Beginning to Pray by Anthony Bloom
  
  
• The Brothers Karamozov
  
  
• Centuries of Mediations by Thomas Trahearne
  
  For adjudicating between denominations:
  
  
• The Orthodox Way by Timothy Ware
  
  
• The Story of Christianity by David Bentley Hart
  
  
  Some essays and blogs:
  
  
• A blog, Glory to God for All Things
  
  
• Some essays, "Christ and Nothing", "Gods and Gopniks", "Daniel Dennett Hunts the Snark", and "Why Don't We Believe in Fairies"
  
  
  Do you need a denomination? Yes. All truths cannot be equally valid; therefore, some denominations must be closer to the truth than others. In the end, Christ teaches that the Church will be preserved throughout history. The question to answer for yourself is: what is the true Church? Obviously, I'm Eastern Orthodox and am convinced my Church is the fullest expression of Christianity, so read my comment as being spoken by a person from a particular group who has his own biases. Feel free to check out Orthodox Christianity if you start looking our way.
  
  Edited

The space-time thing is honestly absurd, I don't see how it could not make sense for a necessary being (insofar as He exists) to not exist. There being no space-time wouldn't matter seeing as how He is a fundamentally immutable and incorporeal being?

As for the supposed witness of other faiths, at that point you have to get into the trenches and quibble logically and philosophically. And I feel that Christianity most definitely wins those battles.

The "problem" of evil isn't really a problem at all. If you read any Plantinga you will become familiar with the free will defense and the moral responsibility (in many forms) defense to that claim. What are the contradictory omni-claims? If you are speaking of how God can be omni-just and omni-forgiving, in Christian theology these adjectives are used to describe qualitative intrinsic maximums, not quantitative infinites, thus there is no conflict.

What is the problem with Atonement, the Trinity, and God's special revelation in the OT+NT? The Gospel is God speaking to everyone who reads it, right now. His Revelation culminated with Jesus Christ, and that was infinitely sufficient. Why would He need to continue talking directly to people, in light of this grand special revelation and His general revelation, not to mention His manifestation through the Holy Spirit throughout our lives? (You'll have to be more specific about the "problems" with atonement and the trinity in order for me to respond to them.)

And I most certainly do see a huge amount of change in my life and the lives of those around me through Christ; I feel that I have gained a true Christian witness in the past year, and since that point my life has become infinitely better and more fulfilling (not to mention religious experiences I and others have had). What are some of the things that Christ told His disciples they could do that believers cannot do? Link specifically to scripture if you want to sustain this objection.

Also, you should read Where the Conflict Really Lies by Alvin Plantinga. It is another fantastic book.

God bless.

Ah! I think I can help! The trick is that intellectuals who think about God tend to dismiss the possibility of Him fitting into a scientific theory. But they don't dismiss the idea as false on these grounds - they believe the world to contain things that science cannot or has not discovered.

You might be interested in learning about natural theology (the study of God through secular means).

Some theologians for God argue for his existence on the basis of metaphysical models. For example, Thomas Aquinas in his Quinquae Via argues for God in this way. If you accept his very technical, specific, and interesting ways of thinking about the universe, then he can be very convincing.

Another group, more heavily favored by modern analytical philosophy, are led by a thinker named Alvin Plantinga. These people construct extremely technical arguments for God (see the modal ontological argument for an example), and also explain how they think God's existence explains certain facts that we all agree on.

For the former group, I'd recommend this book. For the latter, this one. Let me know if I can expand any point of this unfortunately-broad response.

Although it may seem wild at first, I subscribe to John Walton's cosmic temple inauguration explanation. He looked closely at ancient Near Eastern literature and the Hebrew text with emphasis on the Hebrew word for "create" (bara). He discusses two types of ontologies, one material and one functional. Material creation would be what we're most familiar with, like creating a table. An example of functional ontology would be creating a meeting.

Walton makes a convincing argument that Genesis 1 is an account of God's functional creation. He took one week of 24 hour days to inaugurate his material creation, which we can observe components of scientifically but don't have a scriptural description.

I believe Adam and Eve existed but were not the first homosapiens. They were the first to be created in God's image. I also believe (not scripturally, but from our best scientific theories) in the big bang and evolution.

A good analogy would be the creation of a university. The building could take years to build. Faculty and staff would need to be interviewed and hired. Class schedules would need to be designed. The university is functionally created on the first day of class when everyone shows up and fulfills the design.

If you're interested, here is The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate

A lot of responses I've seen aren't being particularly sensitive about this.

I think the best answer was by /u/Panta-rhei. (permalink)

But I'll just add a couple of good resources I think you should check out. Because if the Bible is true and the author of Genesis meant to relate a scientifically testable account of the origins of the material universe, we would have to be very, very cautious about accepting "evidence" that contradicted it.

But I really don't think that was the author's intent. The account of creation given in Genesis is the inspired word of God. It is therefore true. But it isn't meant to give us the kinds of answers to questions about how or when the world was created. That isn't its intent.

So what is it's intent.

Here are the resources:

"The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate" by John Walton

"The Survivor's Guide to Theology"
by M. James Sawyer

(This book gives an excellent account of the origins of Creation Science in the 20th Century with Henry Morris and all the rest -- the book is expensive but it's well worth the money.)

Finally, after you've become comfortable with the understanding of Genesis proposed by John Walton, I might recommend Peter Enns' blog.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/

These are all Protestant/Evangelical sources. If you're up for learning something about what the Church believes about Origins I could point you Joseph Ratzinger's (Pope Benedict XVI) book, "In the Beginning…': A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall" by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.

I hope all this helps. God bless.

You might consider checking out /r/AcademicBiblical for a non-theological approach to the bible. (TBH, most of the recommendations you've received here are theologically based) I know there was a thread there a couple of months ago where they were trying to consolidate resources, but I'm not finding it at the moment.

My go-to resources are these Religious Studies courses available from Yale University. They both do an outstanding job of presenting the texts from a historical-critical approach.

You can also check out this list of resources.

My most trusted recommendations for the OT are How to Read the Bible by James Kugel and Who Wrote the Bible by Richard Friedman.

If you could narrow down your interests a little more - "Bible" is a pretty broad topic - I'd be happy to brainstorm some more ideas.

A friend of mine just recommended this book to me yesterday! This is the book's description on Amazon:

In this astute mix of cultural critique and biblical studies, John H. Walton presents and defends twenty propositions supporting a literary and theological understanding of Genesis 1 within the context of the ancient Near Eastern world and unpacks its implications for our modern scientific understanding of origins. Ideal for students, professors, pastors and lay readers with an interest in the intelligent design controversy and creation-evolution debates, Walton's thoughtful analysis unpacks seldom appreciated aspects of the biblical text and sets Bible-believing scientists free to investigate the question of origins.

It sounded quite interesting. Basically, the author compares the content from Genesis chapter one to other nations' writings on the origin of the world. He also writes that our modern thinking today views the creation story as the creation of the material world, but the original readers would have seen Genesis one as the creation of the functional world. More about organization and function of things, not origin of things.

Again, I have not read the book yet, but plan on it. It does use The Bible but compared with other theories and civilizations I believe. Just thought I'd share since I just found out about this book yesterday!

Some Christians like Lao-Zi. I think the Dao-De-Jing is full of some pretty right on stuff. The Dao tradition is pretty meaningful to me.


The historic Buddha was alright. I actually prefer later Buddhist sages to what information we have about the founder. Buddhism is pretty crazy diverse and interesting.


Muhammad's meh for me. Although there are some interesting aspects to Islamic theology, I don't personally find much meaning straight from Muhammad. Have had reasonably interesting theology talks with Muslims, though.

There's lots, on all different levels. So it depends what you're looking for and what questions are important to you. You might consider:

• Reason for God by Timothy Keller - from Amazon.
  
  If you want to understand the philosophical arguments for God you could try:
  
  
• Reasonable faith or the book with the same name, which sets out some pretty standard arguments.
  
  
• Stand to Reason
  
  
• Unbelievable is a podcast where it's pretty evenly debated.
  
  Specifically on Jesus, you might try,
  
  
• The case for the resurrection of Jesus
  
  
• The resurrection of the Son of God
  
  And one last one which I haven't read, but I hear is good
  
  
• Jesus and the Eyewitnesses
  
  But honestly, simply reading the Bible, praying and earnestly seeking is the best start.

An old standard is St. Augustine's Confessions. A new one is N.T. Wright's The Resurrection of the Son of God.

I find both authors compelling for different reasons. I think Augustine is great at just writing about what it's like to be human. He knew what psychology was before it was invented, and it takes a great deal of honesty and self-reflection and humility to write about what goes on in your head, rather than what you wish went on in your head.

As for Wright, I really like The Resurrection of the Son of God because I think apologetics need to start with the cross.

Simply Christian by NT Wright.

From the back cover:
Why is justice fair? Why are so many people pursuing spirituality? Why do we crave relationship? And why is beauty so beautiful? N. T. Wright argues that each of these questions takes us into the mystery of who God is and what he wants from us. For two thousand years Christianity has claimed to answer these mysteries, and this renowned biblical scholar and Anglican bishop shows that it still does today. Like C. S. Lewis did in his classic Mere Christianity, Wright makes the case for Christian faith from the ground up, assuming that the reader is starting from ground zero with no predisposition to and perhaps even some negativity toward religion in general and Christianity in particular. His goal is to describe Christianity in as simple and accessible, yet hopefully attractive and exciting, a way as possible, both to say to outsides You might want to look at this further, and to say to insiders You may not have quite understood this bit clearly yet.

Edited to add: I see that someone else suggested this. I guess I should have read through suggestions first before suggesting a book.

2nd edit: If you do read this, I would love to hear an atheist's perspective on it.

A bit off topic, but you mentioned Taoism. I am (and always have been) a committed Christian, but LOVE Lao Tsu and the Tao te Ching. Have you read Christ the Eternal Tao written by an Orthodox monk? Awesome book!

> wild discrepancies in the NT

I'm reading The Story of Christianity right now by Justo Gonzalez. He addresses this in particular. It reminded me we need to understand that these discrepancies were not recently figured out. In fact, the discrepancies were discussed and debated all across the church, from Gaul to Egypt. But the strong conviction that the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) were genuine and could be verified trumped any discrepancy. In other words, the church elders included them in some respects because of their differences.

I'm reminded that these men and women, or even the diabolical old men church manipulators-tricksters/saints had every opportunity and plenty of time to change the NT to explicitly suit their purposes. I mean, why not take the differing genealogies and birth accounts and make them match. Revisionist history wasn't uncommon at all. Why leave all those discrepancies when you can edit it up nice and tidy? I'm convinced it's one reason: they had to protect the integrity of the accounts passed down to them.

I know this doesn't necessarily help you in your current situation. I've been where you are often in my life, been a believer for 25 years. Christianity is sometimes a long plodding in the same direction, sometimes it's being so on fire that folks come from miles just to watch you burn.

As far as the OT goes, I'm right there with you. I don't even feign to grasp the multifaceted character of God recounted through those centuries.

That is not what I was saying at all. I was speaking of "God" as the source of being—an understanding of God broadly affirmed by many different religions (Abrahamic, of course, but also Hindu and certain forms of Buddhism, etc.). This God is categorically different than the god whose existence is so often debated by the new atheists and their detractors. It seems to me that the new atheists have created a straw-man version of god that they deny and so many Christians have rallied to defend the truth of that fabrication.

This is a fantastic book if you are looking to learn more.

I read your edit about becoming an evolutionary creationist. Welcome to the club! You should check out BioLogos, a friendly website for exploring the harmony of modern science and Christianity. I also recommend reading The Lost World of Genesis One, by John Walton, and The Language of God, by Francis Collins. They were super helpful for me when I started down the path you're on.

So I only saw one other guy give you apologetics material, and another person made the point that life is pointless if there is no God (which I agree is true).

But you're asking for intellectual material.

I would start with Dr. Edward Feser's Aquinas (A Beginner's Guide). It's $12 paperback on Amazon, $5 on kindle if you have a kindle-enabled device.

After this, if you find yourself convinced, I would go with The Last Superstition by the same man, for $15 paperback on Amazon or $12 on kindle.

Next, you can read excepts from the Summa Theologiae at your leisure for free on http://www.newadvent.org/summa/.

If you're very intellectual, Ed Feser's book Scholastic Metaphysics can really get you into Thomism after you've done the above, or you can pick up some MacIntyre.

I'm not offended, I was just a little frustrated because I felt like I was having to repeat myself too much. I'm sorry if I got short with you.

>The question is can our God and Judge forgo the payment for sins and remain just?

Yes. It is perfectly just to forgive someone that has wronged you because you are the one wronged, and if you do not wish to have someone punished for the wrong doing, it ought to be your call to make.

The rest of this is going to take me going through and reading the scriptures you quoted and then responding, which will take a while, but I'm about to go to sleep. I'll hopefully be able to get back to you tomorrow though. And as for a book, I'm glad you asked! Our own /u/im_just_saying wrote this book a little while back on this exact topic. It's a short and easy read, but a good read, and I'm sure he'd be open to answer some questions for you that I haven't covered.

Two books that I can personally vouch for:

• Christianity: The First 3000 Years (warning: super long and super detailed). Covers Christianity on every corner of the globe. Great book.
  
  
• The Reformation (same author) - reading about the Reformation actually pushed me away from Protestantism. Weird...
  
  You may also enjoy the AskHistorians Book List
  
  

You might want to read more about Eastern Orthodoxy and the Middle Eastern traditions, especially their monastic traditions. I grew up among Baptists too, and also used to think of Christianity almost entirely in terms of the narrow worldview I was raised with, which was something along the lines of "Apostolic era, martyrs, evil Catholic church, yay Protestant Reformation hurray Baptists"...

If you're interested in more info about these churches, here are their Wikipedia articles:

Eastern Orthodox

Oriental Orthodox

Church of the East

Also, if you are still interested in learning more about Christian history, I'd really recommend picking up a copy of this book from Amazon. Even though I'm not really a believer anymore, I've gained tons of understanding and respect for the depth of Christian traditions, largely as a result of this book and research I've done online.

Best book I can recommend on this topic is The Lost World of Genesis One. by John Walton. Walton is a top-notch Genesis scholar and has a high view of the authority of scripture - i.e. we are compelled to believe what the Bible says. However, he makes a very compelling case that the early chapters of Genesis do not teach young-earth creationism.

Biologos is also a great resource. They have many articles/books/bible-studies showing that there is harmony between faith and science.

Henry Chadwick's The Early Church is very good, I think it's considered a classic.

Diarmaid MacCulloch's Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years is very good, heavily footnoted with references on where to read more.

Frances M. Young's From Nicaea to Chalcedon: A Guide to the Literature and Its Background I've heard is good, although it may be more geared more towards scholars than you'd like.

Also heard Ramsay MacMullen's Christianizing the Roman Empire: A.D. 100-400 is good.

A good start.

There's a free Summa Contra Gentiles, Summa Theologica, and Commentaries (on Aristotle, Job, etc.) online if you want.

Furthermore, none of this gets you "saved". These are for Generic God, or rather, the Generic God of classical theism, not specifically Jesus Christ. Although per the Catechism, simply seeking God/truth seems to be good enough to be saved.

For when you get tired of heavy theology, take a look at Gonzalez's church history books. They're both thick and look scary, but they're incredibly smooth and light reading.

Here's the first, takes you all the way to the reformation:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/006185588X/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/190-3299584-6991427

It gives a great overview, though mostly centres on the West. The perspective helps you understand a lot of the church, why certain beliefs became so prevalent after the events of the New Testament, and is seen as a legitimate source of info by secular sources (first read the two volumes for an undergrad course). They're a ton of fun

>Does anybody here have any insight? Suggestions on where I should start? I want to believe in Christ but I don't know how, and I'd very greatly appreciate any insight I could get.

Yes. Read The Resurrection of the Son of God by historian and New Testament scholar N. T. Wright, or watch this lecture summarizing the book's contents. In short: the basic historical facts which justify the inference to the Resurrection are all established by critical historical scholarship, and, in an attempt to explain the emergence of those historical events, the 'Resurrection hypothesis' has, by far, the greatest explanatory power.

Cool! On evolution, Pete Enns' The Evolution of Adam. He takes very seriously the theological implications of evolution, and makes a strong case for Christianity's ability to not only accept it but gain new insights from it. For more of a textual look at Genesis and why a literal reading isn't the best one, John Walton's The Lost World of Genesis One.

On both the non-historicity and cruelty of parts of the OT, check out Thom Stark's The Human Faces of God. This was a huge problem for me in accepting Christianity, probably the biggest hurdle I had to cross, and Stark's book did more than anything else to help me wrestle with it.

On miracles, I'm going to point you at a longer book, but it's well worth a read if you're interested in a strong case. Michael Licona's The Resurrection of Jesus argues that the hypothesis that Jesus rose from the dead should not only be considered, it's actually the strongest one that's been proposed from a historical standpoint, as long as you're not ruling out the possibility that the universe might surprise you sometimes.

And this book I recommend to anybody even remotely intrigued by Christianity: The King Jesus Gospel. It's like seeing the story with entirely new eyes, and it knocks down a lot of really harmful misunderstandings of what the gospel's actually about.

1. I recommend you pick up a book on the history of the bible... reading it from a biblical scholar will probably help you here more than online opinions. For instance:
   http://www.amazon.com/Wrote-Bible-Richard-Elliott-Friedman/dp/0060630353
   
   
2. This is something that is stated by the gospels and Paul... so basically the bible... so if he doesn't believe the bible then I can understand his position. I guess you need to ask yourself if him thinking Jesus a good teacher is good enough?
   
   > He asked me for any piece of evidence that incontrovertibly proves that Jesus is the Son of God.
   
   This is a fool's errand though... he might as well ask for Jesus DNA.

1. I like anchorsawash's answer.
   
   
2. I think this is a misreading of "rested." The point isn't necessarily God was working and now He isn't doing anything. There's a good argument the creation narrative is describing the temple opening ceremony. If this is right, then God "rested" means God was done assigning functions in the temple and now comes to rest in the temple in the sense of sitting on His throne. For more on this reading, see: "The Lost World of Genesis 1" http://www.amazon.com/The-Lost-World-Genesis-One/dp/0830837043
   
   
3. The creation narrative focuses on the assigning of functions as they function for humans. Read this way, it is not surprising to see a focus on the Earth. Again, the point of the narrative is not to give us a scientific understanding of cosmology. The point is to see God's opening of the temple, the place where He would live in relationship with humans.
   
   
4. This can be answered in two different ways on the reading I've suggested above. A). Genesis describes only the assigning of functions and NOT material creation. Material creation occurred much further in the past. The temple opening ceremony occurred much more recently. If this is right, then the scientific evidence can be taken on face value and so can the text (properly understood in context). B). Alternatively, if we see both the assigning of functions AND material creation in Genesis 1, and we want to take the genealogies and such literally, then we have to account for the scientific evidence for the age of the cosmos as being apparent age. There is some textual evidence for this in that Adam and Eve are created as fully formed adults.
   
   
5. I don't believe Mary was sinless.

> Evolution is not a fact

WRONG.

> it's a highly supported theory

Yes. It is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory

From the article;

> A scientific theory is "a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment."

As for this...

> It hasn't been tested, it can't be.

Yes it has. Many times. You'll find explanations of several tests in The Greatest Show On Earth by Richard Dawkins or Why Evolution Is True by Jerry A Coyne.

> Besides, Genesis was written by Moses

No it wasn't.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wrote-Bible-Richard-Elliott-Friedman/dp/0060630353/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1344627342&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.co.uk/History-God-Karen-Armstrong/dp/0099273675/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1344627361&sr=1-1

Both of these books go into various depth on the authors of Genesis (which was actually written by two different people then mashed together later, hence the two different creation accounts in the text). Moses didn't write anything because he never actually existed. The Exodus never happened - there were never any Jewish slaves in Egypt.

For a brief overview of who wrote Genesis see the Wiki article here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Genesis#Composition

> Yeah, that he had raised people from the dead, calmed storms with a word, fed 5000 people with 5 loaves of bread, and came back from the dead after a public execution, appearing to 500 people, some of whom were still around if you wanted to ask. That seems like more than the exaggerations and distortions we see in Herodotus, Tacitus, or Thucydides. And, again, this was all written with access to eyewitnesses. I think it's more than just typical ancient historiography, it's either true or it's nuttery.

Again, claims of miracles were common. I suggest you read Miracles in Greco-Roman Antiquity. And Herodotus provided very unusual exaggerations of history. And ancient history used exaggerations like that a lot. I suggest you ask /r/AcademicBiblical about these concerns, because it is to my knowledge that they are unfounded.


>his apostle John certainly believed Jesus taught he was God

What are you talking about? When did John the Apostle say this?

>He does, however, acknowledge that he is the Son of God, the messiah

The idea that Jesus claimed messiahship or divinity is "naive and ahistorical." (Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity)

It establishes that human beings do not have existence in themselves. We are nothing that has been called into being by grace, that is sustained in being by grace, and when we sever ourselves from the grace of God by sin, we begin to return to the nothing from which we were called out.

This is what God meant when he said to Adam and Eve, "dyning ye shall die;" not just that they would die but that they would remain in a state of death and corruption, that is, falling out of existence and into nonexistence again.

And it is this state of dying and corruption and falling back towards nothingness that Christ comes to save us from.

A very, very good book to read on this topic (and from which I drew the above) is St. Athanasius the Great's On the Incarnation. As a bonus, it's actually not very long; it's less than 100 pages in this SVS Press Popular Patristics Series copy (the volume itself is a little bigger, with introduction and supplementary materials).

In brief? No. To really understand Aquinas and his arguments, you need to read a book-length treatment to understand the 1) underlying metaphysics, e.g. formal causes, efficient causes 2) what he actually means in his infamous "five ways," and 3) the connection between these items and the divine attributes.

I mentioned Edward Feser before, and he does this well in his book, Aquinas. I do have some links you can go through if you're interested. From the man himself, his work Summa Contra Gentiles goes through each of the arguments in a more presentable version than his more celebrated and thorough work, Summa Theologae. For short blog-sized bits of his philosophy, I recommend this blog. On a separate note, one thing I always recommend is Fides Et Ratio written by Pope St. John Paul II in 1995. It is an excellent treatment of the nature of faith and reason, which is terribly misunderstood these days.

Saint Vladimir Seminary Press has produced some nice little paperback volumes with patristic writings, that go for about $10-$15 each, so it's a pretty affordable way to get them, if you like hard copies rather than reading online. I would particularly recommend their edition of Saint Athanasius ["On the Incarnation"](On the Incarnation: Saint Athanasius (Popular Patristics) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0881414271/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_tt6uzbQTQAW7W), both because it's a classic of the patristic age, and because their edition features a preface by C.S. Lewis which is also really excellent.

Here are some links for the product in the above comment for different countries:

Amazon Smile Link: http://smile.amazon.com/3-16-Bible-Texts-Illuminated/dp/0895792524


|Country|Link|Charity Links|
|:-----------|:------------|:------------|
|USA|smile.amazon.com|EFF|
|UK|www.amazon.co.uk|Macmillan|
|Spain|www.amazon.es||
|France|www.amazon.fr||
|Germany|www.amazon.de||
|Japan|www.amazon.co.jp||
|Canada|www.amazon.ca||
|Italy|www.amazon.it||
|India|www.amazon.in||




To help donate money to charity, please have a look at this thread.

This bot is currently in testing so let me know what you think by voting (or commenting). The thread for feature requests can be found here.

The problem here is that your co-worker will never acknowledge evolution's merits because he cannot say that the Bible is wrong or false in any way. Infallability and inerrancy are two core beliefs of fundamentalists about the Bible, and in his view, Genesis is very clear about what happened six thousand years ago.

If you want to convince him that it's OK to look to science for explanations of how the world came to be without giving up his beliefs about the Bible's inerrancy and infallibility, you'll have to tell him about a reasonable alternative explanation of Genesis 1 that still allows room for the reader to look to science for answers regarding the origin of the world.

Here's is a fantastic presentation by Dr. John Walton, a theologian, who interprets Genesis 1 in a different way than a lot of Christians are used to. Walton argues that the creation described in Genesis was not describing the material origins of the world, but rather the functional origins, which is more consistent with the way Ancient Israelites would have understood the concept of "creation" (he explains it all in the video). I heard John Walton talk about this in person (and read his book, The Lost World of Genesis One), and it was what finally made me more comfortable with evolution as a legitimate science, having come from a fundamentalist background myself.

It's from a Christian author and theologian who is sympathetic to the Christian view, and it's on YouTube, so it's free!

>Any good places to get an unbiased look into the history of the world's largest religion?

If you're (really) serious about the broader scope of this question, Christianity: The First 3000 Years comes highly recommended. It's pretty hefty though. Like, don't drop it on pets or small children.

Happy to help. Here are some links I'd recommend.

https://www.amazon.com/Experience-God-Orthodox-Dogmatic-Deification/dp/1885652410/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?keywords=dumitru+staniloae&qid=1564128511&s=gateway&sprefix=dumtru&sr=8-1

https://www.amazon.com/Cosmic-Mystery-Jesus-Christ/dp/088141249X/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?keywords=st+maximus&qid=1564128542&s=gateway&sr=8-3

https://www.amazon.com/Origen-Alexandria-St-Maximus-Confessor/dp/1581122616/ref=mp_s_a_1_34?keywords=st+maximus&qid=1564128599&s=gateway&sr=8-34

Also I can't reccomend this poetry enough

https://www.amazon.com/Divine-Eros-Theologian-Popular-Patristics/dp/0881413496/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?keywords=symeon+the+new+theologian&qid=1564128667&s=gateway&sprefix=syme&sr=8-2

How to Think About God: A guide for the 20th Century Pagan

Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity

Why God Won't Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief

Biblical Games: Game Theory and the Hebrew Bible

The Probability of God: A Simple Calculation That Proves the Ultimate Truth

The Abolition of Man

Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time: The Historical Jesus and the Heart of Contemporary Faith


Reading the Bible Again For the First Time: Taking the Bible Seriously But Not Literally

> [I] regard Jesus as an enlightened (divine) being the same as a Bodhisattva. Can you make any suggestions for books that will help me to undertand more about Jesus' teachings from this perspective?

I think you'll struggle to understand Jesus from that perspective. A lot of his teachings just won't make sense. You'd be better off approaching him from the perspective of 2nd Temple Judaism, which NT Wright is quite good at explaining http://www.amazon.com/Simply-Christian-Christianity-Makes-Sense/dp/0061920622/

I read it, not a big fan of Craig and like I said, I passionately disagree with PSA so there's little point in trying to convince me of it's validity. But on a different note, if you are interested in learning more about non-PSA views of the cross, I highly recommend this book that I just read the other day:

http://www.amazon.com/Salvation-And-How-Got-Wrong/dp/1483904873/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1398025817&sr=8-1&keywords=salvation+and+how+we+got+it+wrong

Justo Gonzalez's two volume The Story of Christianity is one of the best I've run into. Gonzalez is an excellent scholar of Christianity and furthermore was the youngest person to ever earn a PhD in Historical Theology from Yale when he got his.

Volume I

Volume II

The Story of Christianity by Justo Gonzalez would be a fantastic place to start. Im sure its not perfect, but I have been reading it for the past few weeks and its been great.

>We're expected to believe in God when the only "proof" he exists is because the Bible said so

You fell for the Fideism meme. Here's a good place to start the process of curing your unfortunate affliction. Best of luck.

Shirley C. Guthrie's Christian Doctrine, Revised Edition is a fairly accessible, and broad introduction to systematic theology.

As for church history I think Justo L. Gonzalez's The Story of Christianity is a great overview.

• Justo Gonzalez ... am I right everyone??
  
  
• Story of Christianity Volume 1: http://amzn.to/1uymlGu
  
• Story of Christianity Volume 2: http://amzn.to/1y6mYVm
  
• Best $30-$40 you'll ever spend on books!
  
  
• I only know because I run a book review website ... :-D
  www.thebravereviews.com

>Of course you do. A hand being used as a foot cannot be used as a hand.

That a hand can be used as a foot does not mean that a hand is misused. You'll have to actually identify which end is being frustrated.

>Menopause is natural; our sexual organs do not drop off afterward.

Irrelevant. That the sexual organs no longer function does not mean that their end changes.

>To consciously eschew the natural end is to frustrate it.

False.

It's clear that you do not understand what final causes actually are or what it means for a moral agent to actively frustrate natural ends. I would recommend Aquinas: A Beginner's Guide as a primer. A lot of your "objections" show ignorance of what is being discussed.

For all things science and religion I recommend: Where the Conflict Really Lies by Alvin Plantinga and Atheist Delusions by David Bentley Hart (please forgive the title, it was the editor's choice not his).

For the "problem" of Evil I suggest God, Freedom, and Evil again by Plantinga and Evil and the Justice of God by NT Wright.

As a general primer on theology and philosophy go look at Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview by JP Morgan Moreland (not the banking institution) and William Lane Craig.

A recent work by David Bentley Hart, The Experience of God is well worth reading (it is more philosophical than its title lets on).

Ed Feser's The Last Superstition is good and I would also recommend his Scholastic Metaphysics.

Edward Feser is the author you're looking for. He's a philosophy professor who converted from atheism to theism due to purely logical reasoning.

You can read his conversion story here, it's definitely worth reading.

I suggest you either get his book The Last Superstition or Aquinas. Both are relatively clear and easy introductions to the proof of the existence of God formulated by Thomas Aquinas, along with the metaphysical background.

If you don't want to buy/borrow/pirate these books, you could also check out this lecture Feser did (he starts talking at 2.20).

If you don't want to spend an hour listening to the argument he puts forth, you could also check out the subreddit /r/cosmologicalargument, see here for an index of the posts explaining Thomas Aquinas' "First Way".

Of course neither of these last two options is an adequate alternative to reading a real book, but if you don't want to read a book, they're better than nothing.

Maybe you can start with Peter Enns, a Christian professor explaining why Biblical Inerrancy is, well, an errant idea in "The Bible Tells Me So - Why defending scripture has made us unable to read it."

https://www.amazon.com/Bible-Tells-Me-Defending-Scripture-ebook/dp/B00H7LXHJQ

Then, going and reading mainstream biblical scholarship is both enlightening and fascinating - such as Richard Friedman's "Who Wrote the Bible".

https://www.amazon.com/Wrote-Bible-Richard-Elliott-Friedman/dp/0060630353

I don't know what kind of spare money you have, but I highly recommend you read Salvation (And How We Got It Wrong) from /u/im_just_saying. He does a really good job of talking about where the idea of PSA came from, and what the predominant theory of atonement was in early Christianity. For a brief overview of it read about the Christus Victor wiki

The Lost World of Genesis One is a very interesting book written by a Bible-believing Christian for Bible-believing Christians that discusses the theology of Genesis 1.

It mentions evolution in passing, but primarily discusses what a 7 day creation week means from a scriptural/historical point of view.

It's a very readable and interesting book. I don't agree with all of it, but it is certainly a well argued view point.

Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home by Richard Foster

The Art of Listening Prayer: Finding God's Voice Amidst Life's Noise by Seth Barnes

Beginning to Pray by Anthony Bloom\

Letters to Malcolm, Chiefly on Prayer by C. S. Lewis

Giving Ourselves to Prayer by Dan Crawford

Intercessory Prayer by Dutch Sheets

Then of course most any book by Andrew Murray, E.M. Bounds, Richard Foster, the Desert Fathers and Mothers, Dallas Willard, and Mary Margaret Funk; will help with prayer life.

Penal substitution isn't an idea that's present in the OT. Jewish animal sacrifices were never about God punishing an innocent animal in order to forgive the people of Israel.

To quote /u/Rrrrrrr777:

>"Forgiveness is obtained in Judaism by admitting that you've done something wrong, working to correct it, and deciding not to do it anymore. The sacrifices were an integral part of daily life, but they were an outward symbolic representation that helped to bring people closer to God by being forced to confront death head-on in the hopes that the realization would reaffirm their commitment to keeping the commandments to the best of their ability."

Also, if you're questioning PSA, I highly recommend reading Salvation (And How We Got It Wrong) by our very own /u/im_just_saying. It's a very short and accessible book, and really helped me to grasp the flaws inherent in penal substitution.

Full-throatedly endorse Justo L. González's engaging and readable survey, The Story of Christianity.

Reviews here.

To understand the biblical creation account, you have to put it in its cultural context. God inspired the story to tell them that he, alone, was responsible for creation. He didn't give them a science textbook to explain how the cosmos worked; he gave them a story that aligned with their view of the cosmos, and their view was completely different than our view.

For example, the people in that area, at that time, saw the cosmos as: earth (the realm where we are, not a planet), with "waters" above and below. They put "waters" there because the seas they were familiar with represented the unknown and chaos.

If you want more (lots more) information about this, look for John Walton's talks and books:

An intro:
http://biologos.org/resources/videos/john-walton-on-understanding-genesis

A detailed talk—the whole thing is good, but here's where he talks about the cosmology:
https://youtu.be/3a5Fcyb9tD0?t=613

His popular book:
https://www.amazon.com/Lost-World-Genesis-One-Cosmology/dp/0830837043

And Google will return lots, lots more.

If you're a reader, I'd recommend Beginning to Pray by Anthony Bloom. It's a wonderful book for people at all levels of spiritual development or denominations on developing a relationship with God.

Someone else recommended NT Wright, and while I think that's very good scholarship his tome on the resurrection is a very tedious read and for the most part just a huge overview of what people in the ancient Mediterranean world believed about the afterlife. I guess you could skip those parts and only read the conclusions and the last couple of chapters, though.

I'd mainly recommend Mike Licona's "The Resurrection of Jesus: a New Historiographical Approach". It's also a very long read, but more to the point on this subject and very carefully argued. Also, The Jesus Legend by Boyd & Eddy is a very good read on the reliability of the gospels in general.

Are you, like, 14? Have you never encountered a liberal Christian before? Is this only the first of what is sure to be ENDLESS discussions like this?

As I said, read this book:http://www.amazon.com/Reading-Bible-Again-First-Time/dp/0060609192/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319831658&sr=1-1

Justo Gonzalez has a [two volume history of Christianity] (http://www.amazon.com/The-Story-Christianity-Vol-Reformation/dp/006185588X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372722148&sr=8-1&keywords=Justo+Gonzalez), the first covers up to the reformation. Its a pretty good overview, and covers the councils and other key events well.

Friend, it's time to get into philosophy, because let me tell you, it is FAR from an open and shut case when it comes to whether or not it is logical to believe in God.

It's not an easy or a simple topic, and if you want to defend your faith you're going to need to argue about things like metaphysics.
I'll give you some links to get you started:

http://www.studiesincomparativereligion.com/public/articles/Logic_and_the_Absolute_Platonic_and_Christian_Views-by_Philip_Sherrard.aspx

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism

https://www.amazon.com/Where-Conflict-Really-Lies-Naturalism/dp/0199812098

http://pitt.edu/~jearman/Earman2000HumeAbjectFailure.pdf

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_and_Other_Minds

This is something I am struggling with myself. I recently found a book called "Beginning to Pray" by Anthony Bloom, an Orthodox clergyman; only $10 on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0809115093).

I am only on the second chapter, but I am beginning to form a new understanding of prayer - perhaps that is what you need as well. The first chapter of the book, "The Absence of God" is particularly on point with what you are talking about.

I have recently started "contemplative prayer" which really has helped clear my mind and stop the "wandering" - which happens to everyone BTW - perhaps you would want to explore this practice too.

I was a nonbeliever. I'm now a Catholic theologian. The best thing on the market right now that everyone should read is David Bentley Hart's The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss. Most of the atheists and Christians I meet today don't really know what they mean by the word 'God.' A lot of classical theism has been lost to modernity. Hart gets things squared away with what we mean by the word 'God.' It's immensely helpful.

> Even in the Old Testament individual sins needed atonement and covering.

Yet the place for dealing with that was wholly communal.

> Jesus' blood covers our sins on an individual level

I've just read this book which notes, when we talk of Jesus's sacrifice, he is referred to as our Mercy Seat – again, the place of communal appeal to God for forgiveness of the nation's sin(s). No doubt those sins are committed by individuals, but God relates his forgiveness to the whole.

I don't doubt we are on some level saved individually, though. Rather, is our experience as one who is already "washed in the blood" one that approximates a "personal relationship with Jesus"?

I don't have this problem. While I am a creationist myself, I'm open to "how" and for "how much time" did it take. I don't care to take a strong position on literal seven days, seven thousand years, or 13.8 billion years.. God created everything (apart from Man) ex nihilo and this is all that matters in the end of the day.

I suggest reading this book from Christian Philosopher dr Alvin Plantinga.

I recommend you check out Ed Feser's Five proofs of the existence of God, his Aquinas, or his The last superstition. Additionally, Bishop Barron has some good videos on the subject.

This is my favorite introductory book that covers the basics.

For primary sources in regards to the Fathers that gave Eastern Orthodoxy its intellectual shape:

Origen: On First Principles
Gregory of Nyssa: On the Soul and Resurrection and On the Making of Man
Athanasius: On the Incarnation

For more contemporary works, I’d suggest David Bentley Hart’s The Experience of God and That All Shall Be Saved