I’ve been talking to this guy for a few days. He’s pretty much just going in circles now. He thinks the apostles names were just made up from thin air and we cannot get any historical value from any of the scriptures. Anybody wanna throw in some wisdom? His first post said “The historical Jesus is a myth.”
i love this presentation from frank turek https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fyoutu.be%2FybjG3tdArE0%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR1aZzVWAWpWmPG3T5VJOjyFPvJsoqNTtgpiHwdrzwK59VtP3HSf2ZzIpNg&h=AT1XYUGnqRQyWFyYJ5uw0Qoyn-B8RIzpg_iuVa1tscMuymiVjrDF9QoCXzB4mnqDVZj_3efHsKRZjgkkj06nmtWRGezIm25SvhL8IX7SLyU6v7D4veTPovTE-dKAcHsQTXSrbpRJ5uIWki0H5PJi
He doesn’t want to hear truth. The evidence for a historical Jesus is overwhelming.
this is a great clip regarding biblical reliability https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfFibipkIdU&t=64s
ask him if he is just arguing for the sake of it or if he is willing to look at evidence you have to present, if he isnt then its a heart issue not and evidence one. if you send him these talk a look for yourself first
the reason i post the second one, is that the graph at the 2:55 mark he shows the written evidence for Caesar vs the written evidence for Jesus through the bible, does he believe Caesar existed
Mikey, ask him one simple question:
If Christianity is true, will you become a Christian?
If he says yes, then keep praying and keep talking until Holy Spirit says to stop.
If he says anything other than yes…
Like Frank Turek says, that person doesn’t have a head problem with Jesus/God, they have a heart problem with Him…
HE DOESN’T WANT JESUS TO BE REAL.
At that point, walk away from the conversation and pray for him…
This guys theology is lacking in every way. I see two ways to approach his lack in bible knowledge. Either you see this as a challenge and sharpen your theology to jump through his claims and hoops; or you shake the dust off your feet and chalk this up to a naysayer who will argue regardless of content out of bitter scoff.
If you want to invite him to this site we can give him more than great evidence, theology and food for thought if he is open to listen and be amiable. Another position is to remind them that Flavius Josephus, 1st Century Jewish historian writes of Jesus/Yeshua and events. Archeological professionals use the Bible as a map to find historical sites/events/places because of its accuracy. The prophecy alone written thousands of years before is overwhelming! Then you have validations such as the Dead Sea scrolls found in the cave that validated many of the ancient scriptures!
Mikey, there are a lot of more educated people than you, me or him out here, WHO ARE NOT NECESSARILY CHRISTIANS, who wouldn’t be caught dead saying that Jesus didn’t exist. Bart Ehrman, is not a Christian, but as a religious studies professor at UNC he says that anyone who thinks Jesus Christ never existed is foolish…
I would just walk away and pray for the person, it’s not worth the energy.
Most people don’t want to have a real discussion, they just want to hear themselves talk.
Mikey Hinson you may want to use this forum to strength some of your theology. These responses have been considerate and honest.
Ask him to prove that Caesar is real. Or Abraham Lincoln.
Refer him to Gary Habermass and/or Mike Licona.
“Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs”
Matthew 7:6 ESV
This may not be relevant now because he already explained a bunch of inaccurate, non-historical foolishness.
However,
In a situation where you have people like him making a bunch of assertions, just start questioning them…
“What do you mean by that?”
“How did you come to that conclusion?”
“Have you ever considered _______?” And then present the truth of the Gospel and the Bible…
However, Big Mikey, ask him, “How did you come to the conclusion that ‘revelation’ is another word for imagination?”
This is the definition of revelation – a surprising and previously unknown FACT, especially one that is made known in a dramatic way.
Based on THIS definition HIS definition is just a bunch of CONJECTURE and an OUTRIGHT lie…
Mikey, he said that the execution of James was an invention…. REALLY? What about the account documented by Josephus a Jewish historian who was hostile towards Jesus and Christianity????
Big Mikey, ask him what the supposed holes and contradictions he’s talking about are???
Make him tell you ALL OF THEM!
When he tells you… IF HE CAN TELL YOU… Post them here…. We’ll dissect them together.
No serious scholar in any related field denies the existence of Christ. There are many extra-biblical sources that speak of his existence.
I think, “wipe the dust from your feet” is the best course of action here
Almost everything we know in the world is based off of eyewitness testimony. It’s no different with the Bible. The issue at hand is the credibility of the eyewitness, and this particular character you’re trying to witness to is dismissing that testimony out of hand.
Here’s my recommended question: ask him if you were to produce the evidence of the validity of the historical accounts of Christ, as revealed in the Bible, would he believe and repent and submit to Christ? Most likely he’ll say no (either directly or in the form of a deflection). That’ll tell you the issue is not evidential, but moral. He will not believe because he does not want to believe.
Boddie baucham does a great teaching on why we can believe the bible. It’s on you tube..
This video gives evidence ONLY from outside the Bible to prove that Jesus was a true historical figure.
Regarding the discussion if Jesus was just a Myth, one should know that there are a few scholars that believe that Jesus was a myth. This includes Christians and non- believers. Almost all believe, at the very least, that Jesus existed in history. Even the skeptical scholar Bart Ehrman, who has written several books attempting to discredit the Bible, recently published a book arguing that the historical Jesus existed.
We can know that Jesus existed by the 4 eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ ministry that are recorded in the New Testament, in the 4 Gospels. We have good reason to believe all 4 accounts were written within the lifetime of the original Disciples. This important because the fact that the gospels were written early means that there was no time for a myth to grow out of the accounts. This is because the people that actually witnessed the events that were recorded in the Gospels were still alive to refute them.
One further claim was that all the Apostles went to an agonizing death for Jesus, other that John, who was banished. All those men would surely not go to torturous deaths for a lie. But these early followers of Jesus WERE willing to die for the claims they were making.
For more on this, I recommend the reading of A Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.
There is not a critical scholar that doubts the Pauline epistles were written by Paul. Paul says he meet an knew the apostles. Paul has never been accused of being a liar, not even by the most critical scholars. So it stands to reason he wasn’t lying about knowing the apostles, which means they existed.
Historic Jesus. Don’t use the Bible. Yes it is the most validated ancient manuscript. Yes it has the highest source and textual criticism rate (that is a good thing). But let’s not use the Bible.
Tacitus, Pliny, Mara Bar Serapion, Josephus and Suetonius are the biggest contributors to what we know of ancient Roman history. Without their writings we would have next to no history on ancient Rome. None of them were Christian. In fact all were in a position to persecute Christians, so it is not to their advantage to show favoritism towards Christians. In fact there are just as many non biblical sources for Jesus a carpenter from a small red neck town as their are Julius Caesar, the king of the known world.
All of them mention historical Jesus and his crucification and death. So if they are wrong about Jesus, I guess they are wrong about Roman history and we should flush all of the Roman history we know.
Here is a link to Bart Erhman, an agnostic historian, rebuking people who don’t believe in the historical Jesus. If an atheist doesn’t want to listen to good Christian historians then sometimes it helps to show them that no rational modern historian denies the existence of Jesus
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=43mDuIN5-ww#
I recommend this books :Tactics by Gregory Koukl, Cold Case Christianity by J.Warner Wallace, The Case for Jesus by Brant Pitre.
More importantly we should observe 1 Peter 3:15.
Paul.never threw out any covenant. He even upholds Torah.
This guy is uneducated.
Yes you can use the Bible to support Jesus, it’s not even needed however, but yes because the Bible is a collection of historical documents written by eye witnesses, during the lifetimes of other eyewitness.
It couldn’t have been frauded because the general public would easily deny it.
This will shush him up.
If he denies this brother.. Truly. Don’t waste more time on him. He is no.longer a sincere seeker for truth if he willingly denies perfect credible outside Bible evidence.
And like I said the bible also can be used.
People like this guy only do this because the scholars who attest to Jesus’s historical existence aren’t in these conversations to refute and obliterate their fallacious arguments…
Even Bart Ehrman did this. He wrote a book, that was available to the public, trying to discredit the Bible, but when he had to do a scholarly work with an actual Bible scholar, he absolutely had to concede his own fallacious notions…
Jesus has more historians who validate him then Alexander ceaser.
If Jesus didn’t exist, then neither did many figures readily accepted to exist from history. We only have our whole worlds date set close to Jesus birth.
Even Rome couldn’t deny him. Even without having his body they still couldn’t wipe him away or say he didn’t exist.
Ask him to present his evidence. He dismisses the Bible arbitrarily and asserts things happened in another way.
If i was in your shoes i wouldnt bother. People like this are in denial and oblivious to the evidence. You cant help someone who doesn’t want help.
Can’t..
In your entry post, this gentleman you’re speaking of says that Jesus only communicate with Paul and revelation. Right there he’s absolutely wrong. Paul, was Saul a dedicated Jew who killed Christians until he met Jesus on the road to Damascus. He actually heard the audible voice of Christ, he was blinded, so his accounts are faulty at best.
Wait so I won’t be getting my letter to Hogwarts? Well this is just awful!
The gentleman says that he has an open mind? Nonsense. What he believes about Jesus Christ is his own business. All Christians can do is offer a defense for the faith. But he must know that his views are not consistent with what the majority of New Testament scholars think–both conservative and liberal.
Scholars who reject Christian doctrines will not deny the existence of Jesus Christ or the historicity of the early Church. In fact, that the early Church believed that Christ rose from the dead is affirmed by Robert Funk (Non-Christian scholar, founder of the Jesus Seminar): “…The conviction that Jesus had risen from the dead had already taken root by the time Paul was converted about 33 C.E. On the assumption that Jesus died about 30 C.E., the time for development was thus two or three years at most.”
Moreover, the historical document support for the New Testament is better than virtually any other historical document, including the works of Plato, Thucydides, Aristotle, Julius Caesar, and many more. This is quite aside from the Christian belief that the New Testament was “God-breathed.” Even if one denies the plenary inspiration of the New Testament, the documents as historical within the first 100 years of the Church’s origin is reasonably well established. If one wishes to deny this, then one must also deny the historicity of a great many other documents that historians accept.
One final point. The skeptic has not read the New Testament Scripture. He has no knowledge of Greek. In no place is the word translated revelation (apokalupsis) used to refer to the imagination. It comes from “krupto,” which means “to cover, to conceal, or to keep secret.” “Apo” means “away or apart.” United in “apokalubsis,” the two roots convey the idea of “uncovering, unveiling, reveal, laying bare.” So Paul did not speak or see Jesus in “imagination.” Instead, Paul saw the true nature of reality laid bare before him by an act of revelation. In fact, the Book of Revelation is literally the Book of Unveiling. So the gentleman falls outside both New Testament scholarship and Greek scholarship. Intellectually, what he has written lacks merit.
5 names that wrote historically about Jesus:
Tacitus
Nero fastened the guilt … on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of … Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome.
PLINY:
They were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verses a hymn to Christ, as to a god, and bound themselves by a solemn oath, not to any wicked deeds, but never to commit any fraud, theft or adultery, never to falsify their word, nor deny a trust when they should be called upon to deliver it up; after which it was their custom to separate, and then reassemble to partake of food – but food of an ordinary and innocent kind.[10]
JOSEPHUS:
About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he … wrought surprising feats…. He was the Christ. When Pilate …condemned him to be crucified, those who had . . . come to love him did not give up their affection for him. On the third day he appeared … restored to life…. And the tribe of Christians … has … not disappeared.[17]
Babylonian Talmud:
On the eve of the Passover Yeshu was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald … cried, “He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy.”[21]
Lucian the Greek
The Christians … worship a man to this day – the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account…. [It] was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws.[27]
Scripture tells us not to quarrel with fools. This isn’t Apologetics at this point it’s just an argument. Let it go
Pearls before pigs come to mind.
Gentlemen, before wasting your time and breath on any discussion or debate determine whether the person is genuine or not. People can have doubt, and that’s ok. Because we then have a chance to discover together the truth. However, if a person is not open to discussion and their opinion is set in stone rather than moved by truth, fact, evidence, etc. you are wasting your time. Tell this guy to go read “Case for Christ” by Lee Strobel. A journey about an atheist journalist who set out to discredit Jesus and set the story straight. You see, if the person you are talking to is not a student of history then he will discount everything you say regardless of the proof. First century historians like Josephus and Tacitus wrote of the historical Jesus. These and many other external accounts prove without a doubt that a man known as Jesus Barr Joseph of Galilee lived and was crucified and is accredited with the Jewish religious movement known as Christianity. Tell your athiest friend to visit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_Jesus
Mikey Hinson Well Mikey, apparently you are clueless about human nature! Twelve rich powerful men sworn to secrecy during the Nixon era couldn’t keep a secret for twelve days when threatened with jail time the rolled over like little dogs and spilled there guts! Yet 12 men threatened with imminent death never denied the crucifixion or resurrection of Jesus Christ, even after 40 years when the last of them John on the island of Patmos died! And the historical evidence is overwhelming, and you being such a historical scholar should know this from the writings of Josephus! Pilate, Ananias Caiaphas, were all historical, real life figures! So was the procuration of the census by Augustus, of the whole Roman world the reason Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem to fulfill the prophecy of Jesus’s birth! So you can blow this off with your typical cavalier attitude of unbelief, but that would just prove my point and opinion of you! Oh show me the contradictions that you speak of?
dude u dont.. keep it movin?
observe that he states……Revelation is another word for imagination….This is a lie. From this point anything can be written because of its foundation, as I said, a lie.
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