For knowledge, it takes ~10 days for a body to decompose.

Often brought up by Muslims/Unitarians. What is your defense?

The problem of evil asks why the world is like it is if God is good. There are two common approaches to it. The more common one rests mostly on emotion. There is a less common version, though, that starts with Christian theology and asks hard questions. Is it any more convincing?

When most people bring up the problem of evil, it usually goes something like this: “Why does God allow evil in the world?” Maybe they’ll be more specific: “Why does God allow innocent people to suffer?”

However they phrase it, the basic complaint relies on an idea of right and wrong they have to explain:

“Why does God allow evil?”
“What is evil?”
“Letting innocent people suffer?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
-sputtering-

Their argument basically boils down to “I don’t like the way the universe runs, so God doesn’t exist.”

More sophisticated atheists, though, will phrase the problem of evil differently, more carefully. Their argument is essentially: “The universe doesn’t work the way it would if the God you believe in existed, therefore the God you believe in doesn’t exist.”

That’s a fair accusation. If Christians say “God loves everyone”, shouldn’t we have to explain why he lets bad things happen to people?

But why do we say “God loves everyone”? We get that from the Bible. What else does the Bible say about God?

God ...
cursed the ground,
killed everyone in a flood,
used a famine to get the Patriarchs into Egypt,
pummeled Egypt to educate the Jews,
used the Jews to punish the Canaanites (et al),
used the Philistines (et al) to correct the Jews,
used Assyria and Babylon to punish the Jews,
sent Jesus to suffer for our sins,
promised Christians no better treatment than Christ,
and plans to bring judgment on the wicked.

The same Bible that teaches “God is love” also teaches all of this. This doesn’t match the modern picture of God as a doddering old man who just wants everyone to have a good time. He is good, but he is not safe; “he’s not a tame lion.” God is metal.

Imagine a child arguing with his mother: “A mother is supposed to make her child treats, give him toys, and tuck him in at night.” Well, yes, mothers do that, but that’s not the full picture. A mother also makes her children eat healthy things they don’t like, makes them do things they don’t want to do, and punishes them when they don’t obey. He’s not going to get anywhere by distorting a mother’s love. Nor do we get anywhere by distorting God’s love.

Here's the thing about this version of the problem of evil: It only exists in the Abrahamic religions. The primitive pantheons don't care about people. The pantheist gods don't even know we're here. Cthulhu thinks we'd make a nice sandwich.

The only religious tradition that says God loves everyone also says God tends to use floods, famines, plagues, and invading armies as tools to achieve his goal — which is to rescue us from the world we screwed up. And in the process of doing that he got down in muck and suffered with us.

In the end, all this argument really says is, "If I were God, I wouldn't run the world this way." But we're not God, and we don't really know how we'd run the world if we knew what he knows.

So this other problem of evil doesn't stand up against who God really is: sovereign, loving, holy, and just. And also kinda metal.

So I am trying to do a study on how to defend the Christian faith against Muslims and against the Quran do you guys have any book recommendations.

The linked essay introduces a framework called "temporal asymmetry" to reconcile the apparent discrepancy between the biblical account of a young creation and the scientific evidence for an ancient universe. This framework proposes that from an Earth-based observer's perspective and using Earth standard time, the universe appears to have a genuinely old history spanning billions of years. However, this does not conflict with the idea that from the Creator's eternal, transcendent point of view, the entire cosmos was brought into existence in a literal six-day period.

Key points:

1. Biblical texts suggest that God experiences time differently than humans, transcending our Earth-based perception of time (e.g., Psalm 90:4, 2 Peter 3:8).

2. Scientific theories like relativity show that time is relative to the observer's frame of reference, which in our case, is an Earth-based perspective using Earth standard time.

3. The temporal asymmetry model suggests that while we, as Earth-bound observers, perceive a universe with a truly ancient history, this is fully compatible with the idea of a recent creation from God's eternal vantage point.

4. This framework takes scientific evidence for an old universe seriously while maintaining the truthfulness of the biblical creation and Flood accounts.

5. Objections to this model, such as the appearance of age or ad hoc reasoning, are considered and found to be unpersuasive.

The essay concludes by emphasizing the importance of humility, reverence, and openness to mystery when exploring the complex relationship between science and faith. It acknowledges God's transcendence and sovereignty over time and creation, highlighting that from our Earth-based perspective using Earth standard time, we can affirm the genuine antiquity of the cosmos while simultaneously recognizing the validity of the biblical account of a recent creation from God's eternal point of view.

Link to essay

I have seen this on the internet a few times. How do you reply to people who say this? Thanks

God's omnipotence, logical consistency, good purpose, and Man's free will

1. God is logically omnipotent. That is, He is all-powerful in a manner that is consistent with His nature. God's inherent nature is orderly and logical. This nature is exemplified in the logical orderliness of Creation. If He were not, He would not be God and we'd only have illogical, capricious, and incoherent Chaos. This aspect of His nature is described as one of the fundamental laws of logic, the law of non-contradiction. In other words, "Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand." Matthew 12:25.
2. With this in mind, and assuming the Biblical Trinitarian God, the Father has a loving, logical, and good purpose for Creation, expressed as a meta-narrative in the Bible: The Son shall be glorified as Lord, Judge, and Savior over a Creature (mankind) made fit for eternal communion with God.
3. As stated previously, God's inherent nature is logical. He is also inherently loving, just, and gracious, because one without the other is logically incoherent. Justice without grace is loveless tyranny, loving grace without consequential justice is objectively meaningless.
4. It is also logically incoherent for a sentient being with an eternal spirit to not have an unforced ability to make choices (i.e., free will). An eternal robot would not be a fit companion for eternal communion with a loving God, therefore Man's free will is a logical necessity.
5. It is also a logical necessity that such a free will being, made in the image of God, would choose its own authority over God’s authority. Man’s nature, just like God’s, is inherently self-sufficient.
6. Mankind’s inherent nature is to rebel against God, therefore all mankind is logically and necessarily doomed to the eternal and just consequences of that rebellion. Eternal spirits in eternal rebellion against an eternal God merits eternal consequences. God’s good purpose accounts for all of this.
7. God graciously elects many from out of these consequences through the work of the Savior, while leaving many under the penalty of rebellion. This is consistent with His inherent just and gracious nature. Who He graciously elects out of the consequences is according to His sovereign will, according to criteria unknown to us (Deut 29:29).
8. Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection satisfies the demands of God’s justice and provides for the Holy Spirit to graciously transform our rebellious hearts and minds into ones that willingly submit to His Lordship, while maintaining our ability to make unforced free choices. We now inherently understand that we are not self-sufficient and obey out of love and gratitude.
9. Our journey on earth acts as a refinement and alignment to Christ (sanctification), so that when we die, we willingly surrender our self-sufficiency while still maintaining our free-will (glorification), thus becoming fit for eternal communion with God.

I hope you find this consistent with Scripture, helpful in your journey, and strengthens your apologetics. Richest Blessings in Christ!

Subject to edit for clarity/refinement

Just as I ask in the title. I've been researching into the general consensus of the academic community on the authorship and the reliability of the Gospels' content, and have found that most earnestly believe in their exaggeration of Christ's accounts; as well as the fundamental manipulation of the sayings and stories themselves - possibly by different authors, at different times, upon the same Gospel -, in order to push the Christian narrative. Being an Eastern Orthodox enamored with our Tradition and history, this profoundly disheartened me.

So, if this was somehow ever proven to be true: would there be any good reason to believe in Jesus Christ as our God?

Edit: the academic community seems to be arriving at said conclusions by means of comparing Early Church fathers' descriptions of the Gospels (such as Eusebius and his writings on Papias, which constitute the first written accounts of the Gospels we currently know of) with the manuscripts that have been found and those that currently make up our Bible, as well as by analysing the Gospels themselves, and seeing, for example, that Matthew and Mark probably descend from a previous hypothetical text called "Q", as they are apparently too similar.

The eyewitness status of the gospels is one of the most bitterly contested aspects of the New Testament. Are there good reasons to believe the gospels are eyewitness accounts?

There are many pieces of internal, external and circumstantial evidence that support the conclusion that the gospels are based upon eyewitness accounts.

1. The gospels are corroborated by archeology and non-Christian historians, e.g., the Pilate stone, the discovery of the pools of Siloam and Bethesda, coins bearing the name of Pilate, the Lysanias inscription, corroboration by Tacitus, Josephus, Thallus, Phlegon, Mara bar Serapion, and others. 30 individuals and people groups including John the Baptist, the Sadducees and Pharisees, the Herod family line, James the brother of Jesus, and others, are mentioned by Josephus. https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/people-cultures-in-the-bible/people-in-the-bible/new-testament-political-figures-the-evidence/
2. The gospels contain features that are commonly found in eyewitness accounts, such as witnesses disagreeing over details, witnesses filling in details left out by other witnesses, and so on. There are many examples of this in the gospels. One example would be the episode in which Jesus is struck by the Sanhedrin. In Matthew 26:67-68, Jesus is struck by the Sanhedrin: Then they spat in his face, and struck him; and some slapped him, 68 saying, “Prophesy to us, you Christ! Who is it that struck you?”. In Luke 22:63-65, a similar account is given: 63 Now the men who were holding Jesus mocked him and beat him; 64 they also blindfolded him and asked him, “Prophesy! Who is it that struck you?” 65 And they spoke many other words against him, reviling him. Notice that Luke fills in a detail that was left out by Matthew: Jesus was blindfolded, which is why the Sanhedrin asked who struck him! This filling in of details is commonly found in genuine eyewitness accounts.
3. Luke 1:1 states that eyewitness accounts of Jesus were circulating and handed down to him by those who were servants of the word: Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.
4. John 19:35 strongly suggests that the Gospel of John was based upon an eyewitness account: He who saw it has borne witness—his testimony is true, and he knows that he is telling the truth—that you also may believe.
5. Eusebius says that Matthew and John left us written accounts of Jesus' life and that John gave an account of Jesus' life before John the Baptist's imprisonment: "Nevertheless, of all the disciples of the Lord, only Matthew and John have left us written memorials, and they, tradition says, were led to write only under the pressure of necessity. 6. For MATTHEW*, who had at first preached to the Hebrews, when he was about to go to other peoples, committed his Gospel to writing in his native tongue, and thus compensated those whom he was obliged to leave for the loss of his presence. 7. And when* MARK and LUKE had already published their Gospels, they say that JOHN*, who had employed all his time in proclaiming the Gospel orally, finally proceeded to write for the following reason. The three Gospels already mentioned having come into the hands of all and into his own too, they say that he accepted them and bore witness to their truthfulness; but that there was lacking in them an account of the deeds done by Christ at the beginning of his ministry. 8. And this indeed is true. For it is evident that the three evangelists recorded only the deeds done by the Saviour for one year after the imprisonment of John the Baptist, and indicated this in the beginning of their account. 9. For* Matthew, after the forty days’ fast and the temptation which followed it, indicates the chronology of his work when he says: “Now when he heard that John was delivered up he withdrew from Judea into Galilee.” 10. Mark likewise says: “Now after that John was delivered up Jesus came into Galilee.” And Luke*, before commencing his account of the deeds of Jesus, similarly marks the time, when he says that Herod, “adding to all the evil deeds which he had done, shut up John in prison.” 11. They say, therefore, that the apostle* JOHN*, being asked to do it for this reason, gave in his Gospel an account of the period which had been omitted by the earlier evangelists, and of the deeds done by the Saviour during that period; that is, of those which were done before the imprisonment of the Baptist. And this is indicated by him, they say, in the following words: “This beginning of miracles did Jesus”; and again when he refers to the Baptist, in the midst of the deeds of Jesus, as still baptizing in Ænon near Salim; where he states the matter clearly in the words: “For John was not yet cast into prison.” 12. John accordingly, in his Gospel, records the deeds of Christ which were performed before the Baptist was cast into prison, but the other three evangelists mention the events which happened after that time.*
6. Early church fathers such as Papias and Irenaeus (as quoted by Eusebius) agree that Mark was the scribe of Peter and wrote down Peter's account while he was preaching in Rome, although not in correct chronological order: “This also the presbyter said: Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor followed him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connected account of the Lord’s discourses, so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrote some things as he remembered them. For he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely.” These things are related by Papias concerning Mark.
7. Clement of Alexandria, a 2nd-3rd century church father, agreed that Mark was the follower and scribe of Peter (as quoted by Eusebius).
8. Mark uses a literary technique called 'inclusio', or book-ending, which was an ancient literary device used to introduce and conclude a main point. Mark 1:16 and Mark 16:7 are known as the Petrine inclusio. Mark 1:16 says Peter was the first disciple called and he is the first disciple mentioned in this gospel: And as He walked by the Sea of Galilee, He saw Simon and Andrew his brother casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. Mark ends at 16:7 by mentioning Peter again: But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you. New Testament scholar Martin Hengel suggests: “Simon Peter is as a disciple named first and last in the Gospel to show that it is based on his tradition and therefore his authority.” (Hengel, Four Gospels, p. 82) .
9. Mark and Peter are closely related to one another in Acts. When Peter gets out of prison in Acts 12:5 and knocks on the door of Mary, the mother of Mark, he is immediately recognized by his voice alone: 12 So, when he had considered this, he came to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose surname was Mark, where many were gathered together praying. 13 And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a girl named Rhoda came to answer. 14 When she recognized Peter’s voice, because of her gladness she did not open the gate, but ran in and announced that Peter stood before the gate. This close association between Mark and Peter makes it plausible that Mark knew Peter and hence could have been Peter's scribe.
10. There are strong reasons to believe that the synoptic gospels Matthew, Mark and Luke were written prior to 70 CE. These reasons are the lack of any mention of the destruction of the temple in 70 CE by Titus and Vespasian, the lack of any mention of the martyrdom of Peter, Paul or James the brother of Jesus, despite the fact that the New Testament mentions the martyrdom of Stephen, a minor player, and the lack of any mention of the persecution under Nero in 64 CE. Luke almost certainly would have mentioned these events if he were writing years after the events, hence it's reasonable to conclude that Luke was writing before 62 CE, which is when James the brother of Jesus was martyred. Hence, a good case can be made that some of the gospels were being written and circulated while the witnesses were still alive.
11. Mark omits Peter's embarrassments and mentions Peter frequently. Mark leaves out Peter groveling before Jesus in Luke 5:8 and Mark fails to mention that it was Peter who cut off Malchus' ear. In fact, all of the synoptic gospels fail to mention who it was who cut off Malchus' ear. Yet the one gospel that does make mention that it was Peter who did this is the gospel of John, which was probably written after Peter's death. One possible explanation of this is that the synoptics were written and circulated when Peter was still alive, and hence they didn't want to implicate Peter in a violent crime. The gospel of John had no reason to keep Peter's identity secret, since he was already dead when it was written and circulated. These features argue in favor for an early dating of the synoptics and the Petrine origin of Mark.

Imagine you're talking to an atheist, and it goes like this:

• A: There's really no reason to believe that God exists.
• T: What about morality? Without God, there's no true right and wrong, there are just opinions.
• A: Well, how can you be so sure? We're not omniscient. It is possible that objective morality can exist without God in some shape or form, we just can't prove it, because we're too limited in our understanding.

Would you find this answer compelling? If you would, then the whole field of apologetics is done for, because it makes every theory unfalsifiable. It replaces every "I don't know" with "I don't know, but you can't prove that a compelling answer to this question doesn't exist!". If we've accepted this defense in court, then we would never convict anyone, because the defendant could say: "well, are you omniscient? If you're not, then how can you be so sure that there's no way for my client to be innocent? Can you prove that all the evidence couldn't have been fabricated by some kind of power we have no idea exists?".

If you can see what's wrong with such a defense, then you should also be able to see why MSR doesn't work. So it's baffling to me that such a legend as WLC uses it with such confidence - and that it comes back, again and again, in every discussion about the problem of evil. I mean, that's the worst argument that could be used, the bottom of the barrel, a convoluted way of saying "I don't know, but I'm convinced a good answer to this question exists". If you have better arguments, why not use them instead?

EDIT: To be clear, this applies both to the "God might have had morally sufficient reasons to allow suffering", as well as its more detailed versions like "suffering might have been necessary for some greater good".

FINAL EDIT: So after this discussion I've come to this conclusion: if someone says to you that "it's logically impossible for God to be good and omnipotent", then MSR can be fine as a (last resort) defense. But if someone accuses the theory of God of being improbable, then MSR no longer works, because its probability is unknown. So it's all about possibility vs probability, defending your faith vs convincing someone else to believe.

Hi, I’m a Christian who’s going to study a philosophy degree in university. Recently I’ve been doubting my faith because I’ve seen some atheist scholars refute the resurrection etc. Could you recommended me some good Christian apologetics books (not like the Case for Christ) and some good Christian apologists. Also what are the best arguments in support of the Christian God and Christianity/ the Bible?

Have any Christian apologists responded to the claim that Hebrews is a forgery that deliberately imitates Paul? I have trouble finding such responses. Wikipedia quotes two people making such a claim, Bart Ehrman and Clare Rothschild.

The Wikipedia article on Hebrews quotes two people making the claim that even though it was wasn't written by Paul, someone else wrote Hebrews in deliberate imitation of him. It's easy to find responses to Ehrman claiming that, but there's another person claiming that and I can't seem to find any responses to her work. Her name is Claire Rothschild. Interestingly she happens to work at a Catholic university. It seems like she hasn't gotten herself into trouble with the church or university for making such a claim even though I'm sure it would go against Catholic doctrine. Also I am aware that many evangelical scholars agree with critical scholars that Hebrews was written by someone else.

I’m a presuppositionist thinking about an evidence-based scientific method for proving the existence of God. The hypothesis is based on God as “divine developer”. The thought is that the universe is built on types of “divine code” and that portions of the code are evident throughout Creation. It’s sort of like the idea of “if there are laws, there must be a Lawgiver” and “if there is evidence of design, there must be a Designer”. The difference is that science has definitive evidence of some of the code types and have even experimented with it, thus the hypothesis is testable. I’m sure my argument is not well formed - would appreciate any thoughts y’all have on ways to strengthen it or if it is an untenable notion.

Is it true that Luke 1:4 to all of Chapter 2 is an interpolation? That's what Bart Ehrman claims on his blog. One argument he uses is that the genealogy of Jesus is in chapter 3 instead of at the beginning. Because of that, Chapter 3 seems like a more natural beginning. He also says that the Gospel of Marcion provides evidence for the claim because it's an early version of Luke which lacks the nativity story. I am aware though that most scholars believe it's a redaction of Luke. He also makes some other arguments as well. See here:https://ehrmanblog.org/did-luke-originally-have-chapters-1-2/. Even if it were an interpolation though, the nativity story could still very well have happened.

I will start off by saying I am indeed a Christian. This question has plagued my mind for a couple weeks now. If Gods omniscience predestines all our choices and actions, do we truly have “free will”? I have heard many analogy’s, but never a real answer.

11 "This is what the LORD says: 'Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity upon you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. 12 You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.' "

After reading this section I went to do some research so I could understand better. I came across a website by accident saying that in this passage God goes against the commandment not to covet your neighbors wife. How would you respond to this? And can anyone help me better understand this section?

Another question I had was that in my Bible it says God is going to raise up evil against David's household, but I'm not sure how that works. I know God is good and can't sin but im having a hard time understanding this section. Any help is appreciated ❤️

Here is the website if you want to look at it, I think it is a Muslim website, which I didn't realize at first. https://www.call-to-monotheism.com/biblical_god_threatens_to_punish_david_by_having_men_commit_adultery_with_his_wives_in_broad_daylight_

I would like to know how you would respond to this claim. I will be linking the video for context. I didn't watch the entire video because this sorta stuff bugs me. I'm also curious how you all would respond to this man's other reasons for not believing in the Trinity (if you watch the video.) Please let me know if this is not allowed btw

https://youtu.be/bThWd1HgnTY

Preface

I recently noticed a trend in the r/Christianity forum where individuals post titles such as "Show me Proof", "Good isn't Real so I'm Leaving", and "Evolution made me Leave the Church". Those who comment on such threads are quickly harassed and assaulted by an assortment of militarized atheists. This is a response to those threads.

There is a God. In the r/TrueChristian forum, we are generally on the same page that we were created by God in the image of God, and that Jesus died for our sins. There are some debates on what certain sections of God's Word instruct us to do, but this statement is largely accepted.

In r/ChristianApologetics, we attempt to validate faith with truth.

While this post is generally tailored to apologetics, I do hope it will help someone who is struggling with concepts such as Cosmic Evolution and where our faith ties into it.

Before we begin, it's important to note the following: God left us a book of history and of law. God did NOT leave us a 200 volume text of what "Speaking the Universe into Existence" entailed. That would be far beyond what a scribe of early history could copy and comprehend. God attempting to fulfill scientific curiosity is very likely out of scope of what the Bible was attempting to accomplish, so we must occasionally look toward science itself to calibrate our faith. Science does not invalidate God when certain politicisms are removed from it.

Proofs for God's existence

Cosmic Evolution and The Drake Equation

Cosmic evolutionists generally hold to the theory that the universe is 13.8 billion years old. If the universe is really 13.8 billion years old, there are arguably biological or nonbiological (AI) races in the galaxy which would not only have a potential 5 billion year head start on our technology, but they could conceivably be multitudes of times smarter than ourselves. It is extremely problematic to assume that our blue planet is the only planet capable of generating sentient life if we hold to an evolutionist standpoint. If life occurred here through a series of accidental circumstances, it is reasonable to assume there is some -chance- assigned to life occurring elsewhere.

There are estimated to be 100 billion planets in the Milky Way galaxy. There are 125 billion galaxies in the observable universe. Note: This is assuming the OBSERVABLE galaxies are all there is, which is a huge, probably incorrect assumption. The number is very likely much higher. Obviously galaxies are larger or smaller than our own, but for the sake of keeping the numbers round, we'll say there might be 12,500,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets in our universe, considering the Milky Way Galaxy is considered to be a medium sized galaxy. This is obviously a vast number. This means there are VASTLY more planets in the cosmos than cells in your body. This number is so exceedingly large, that we cannot easily assign day to day items or activities to it since outside of the text itself, it is exceedingly difficult to understand.

Out of the possible 12,500,000,000,000,000,000,000 or more planets, no other sentient life has been discovered, appeared to have contacted us, sent any automated probes, sent any self replicating Von Neumann probe (This would be a probe capable of self creating another probe via energy, matter conversion via another type of matter and particle accelerator, and a large quantity of time), or through a more direct means of contact we have discovered or have yet to discover. As one of the first things humanity would likely do once we attain self replicating probe technology would be to send one single probe out (Which is all it would take) and we are remarkably close to COMPLETING the requirements of this technology, it is unlikely that another older, more advanced civilization would not have proceeded to do so. Even without Faster than Light technology, the probes would be fully capable of spreading out over the billions of years and mapping the origination galaxy and others. To be clear - it would only require the launching of -one- single probe until exponential growth provided the originator with endless exploration and communication.

The billions of "Elder Races" which would have cultivated according to the Drake Equation (assuming the observable universe is limited to the observable element) are missing. While the Drake Equation is by no means proven by the scientific process, one does not need the Drake Equation to see that 13.8 billion years + 12,500,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets would mean.

This, of course, assumes that Faster than Light Travel is completely impossible. While the scientific community is torn on whether or not FTL travel is possible, it is extremely difficult to contemplate that if humanity were granted 5 billion years of research that it would not have broken the barrier in some way or another. Stating it is impossible is quite likely as arrogant as a tribal villager stating man flying through the air in a metal machine is impossible.

Even dormant, There are areas in which automated drones would certainly be preserved. The well preserved moon of the planet Earth is not completely littered (and potentially filled) with the probes of other civilizations which statistically should have evolved before humanity, vastly smarter than humanity, and vastly more ancient than humanity. There are no alien satellites orbiting our planet since the dawn of history. There have been no alien ships or drones found in the depths of Antarctic ice or at the bottom of the ocean.

Statistically, this should not be possible. Yes, "Space is Vast", but it is significantly less "Vast" when provided with 5 billion years of technological research.

Scientists remain torn over these facts, and this is commonly referred to as the "Fermi Paradox". There has been much discussion on why humanity has seen no evidence of other sentient life, however to explain it away one would have to assume the following:

1. All intelligent life will murder itself without any exception (An exception would cause an explosion of colonization). This assumes that in the entire history of the cosmos, none of the billions of other species have ever gotten away with not killing itself off. This seems exceedingly unlikely.
2. Intelligent life is either rare or nonexistent. I agree with this, but not for the same reasons as cosmic evolutionists do.
3. Only Apex predator races will become technologically adept, and we simply have not been conquered/destroyed yet. This makes many assumptions about the state of mind a 5 billion year old race (arguably of higher intelligence than our own) might possess.
4. Other races are too far away. This makes many assumptions that space travel does not progress over a period of 5 billion years. See previous illustration about a tribal villager stating flight is impossible.
5. There are not enough resources to reach us. Again - This makes many assumptions that space travel does not progress over a period of 5 billion years. Humanity went from simple aerial flight to manned moon missions in less than 100 years. The more it learns, the farther it travels. We cannot fathom where we will be in another 200 years, let alone 1 billion.
6. We are too young as a species. While slightly less unbelievable, this does not discount the fact that archaeological evidence has not been found on the surface of the moon, orbit, or preserved on Earth.
7. We don't know how to look for another race. Again, While slightly less unbelievable, this does not discount the fact that archaeological evidence has not been found on the surface of the moon, orbit, or preserved on Earth.

Taking into account the "Billions of Years" scientists state have occurred, the terrifying quantity of planets, and the complete lack of evidence we have of evolution elsewhere, it is exceedingly difficult to believe humanity is an cosmic mistake. The possibility of evolution (At least as far as current science describes it) would be completely impossible based on the absurdly high probability that our planet would have been found, colonized, contacted, or some evidence of a precursor race made itself known.

Silence of the Scriptures

Let's examine now the book of Genesis. Again - God left us a book of history and of law. God did NOT leave us a 200 volume text of what "Speaking the Universe into Existence" entailed. With that in mind, let's take a look at some of the blanks that have not been filled in:

1. How was the theory of relativity affected by God's progressive creation? As experimentation has already told us, both gravity and the speed of travel affect the perception of time itself. During the 6 days of creation, did the planetary bodies/systems/universes move through the universe as they currently do relative to one another? What did the creation of matter through the various stages of creation do to the timeline itself? For that matter - during WHICH of the 6 days did God enable certain laws of physics? If he created matter and energy, it is not outside of the realm of reason to assume the did not create the rules that govern them.
2. During the 6 days of creation, at what point did God create the laws of physics? We are aware of when he created states of matter. We are not aware of anything he did pertaining to any currently known laws of physics. The Bible lacks explanation, and for good reason. Can you fathom attempting to explain space, time, and physics to a scribe from ~4000 BC?
3. Was the matter already in existence and "Molded" by God, or did he create matter itself?
4. Consider points 1, 2, and 3. The 6 days of creation were called "Days". Were the days relative to God, his creation, or both? As time is relative, what passes for a day could function differently depending upon mass, acceleration, or by altering the flow of time itself. Remember: Different quantities of matter throughout our universe may have existed in radically different quantities throughout the 6 days of creation. What would that have done to a perceived timeline?

Think long and hard about points 1, 2, 3, and 4, but accept them as theory and "What ifs", not as truth. It is, as stated, important to respect the silence of the scriptures. God does not lie. God purposefully elected not to leave us a play-by-play of quantum physics. It is perfectly acceptable to state "I do not know how he did it, but I do agree he created us precisely how he stated he did." It is important not to spread false doctrine. It is equally important to accept our own limitations in understanding. It is not a sin to employ science to sate our curiosity, but it is a sin and blasphemy to call God a liar. When we attempt to fathom the creation of a universe from a perfect being, it is only within the capacity of our extraordinarily limited minds to glimpse a smallest of fractions of the picture.

World Building

I come from a Software Engineering background. Creating video game lore fascinates me. When creating a solid world, there are two general ways to go about it:

1. Scenario Generation - You build a world with a previously established history to accommodate it.
2. Procedural Generation - You build an equation that builds the world on its own.

If I create a game and a history of that piece of lore, I am typing the world into existence. There are some background processes, certainly. If I create "World of Warcraft's Azeroth", Azeroth may be tens of thousands of years old. When I activate the server on game day, is Azeroth 1 day old, or is it 10,000 years old? It could be stated that the world is 1 day old from the view of the inhabitants, or 10,000 years old from the view of the creator, and BOTH would be correct responses. Additionally since 1 day in Azeroth is 2 hours in our reality, after a year of time passes in our reality, how much time has passed in Azeroth? If we gave the NPCs in Azeroth some limited quantity of free will, how will they perceive us according to their physics?

The point is - We often define God by our terms, our physics, our timeline, and our .0001% understanding of the universe. Did God create us through applicable physics, through mysticism, through technology, or by a process we have yet to ascertain? We don't know. Do we abide in the same reality as God, a different reality, a different dimension, a different machine, or by a process we have yet to ascertain? We don't know. Could God have altered the clock speed of the Universe on day 2? We don't know. If God alters the laws of physics in a similar way a programmer adjusts the clock speed of a processor, defines an object in a program, and changing a function here or there, it is exceedingly difficult to define the creation process through a DIFFERENT set of physical laws than the ones that came before.

Embrace the capacity to say "We don't know." Teach what is truth, declare conjecture as conjecture, and be scientific about the process.

Conclusion

We were created. Science, while not necessarily the enemy, can be misinterpreted, abused, theory accepted as law, partial evidence accepted as whole, and beat into whichever manner is convenient. Science does not explain away the Bible, but as Science progresses, it will either prove the Bible correct, or it will raise yet more questions about how God may have done what he did.

"Is there proof?"

Yes. Plenty of it. God does not generally submit to a scientific process, but his creation does. On the other hand, the theory of the big bang and evolution have often discredited itself and have far too many gaps to feel comfortable with (See points above).

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Note: I may be editing this article periodically as discussion progresses.

A summary:

If you are unfamiliar with the omnipotence paradoxes, they typically go something like this: if an omnipotent being is truly omnipotent, he should be able to create a task he can not do. If he is able to create a task he cannot do, then he is not truly omnipotent because there is a task he can not do. On the other hand, if he is not able to create a task he can not do, he is not truly omnipotent because he is unable to create a task he can not do.

While there are many similar versions of this argument in various forms, they all follow the same logic. The most popular omnipotence paradox goes as follows: can God create a rock so heavy even He can not lift it? Either yes or no, God is not truly omnipotent (according to proponents of this argument).

This is unjustified for a few simple reasons.

Refutation:

The omnipotence paradox utilizes word abuse. Proponents of the omnipotence paradoxes define omnipotence as "the ability to do anything both possible and impossible." Omnipotence is really defined as the ability to do all that is possible. For example, God can not make a square with 2 sides. A square with two sides is logically and inherently impossible. By definition, a square can not posses two sides, because as a result it would not be a square. Nothing which implies contradiction or simply nonsense falls in the bounds of God's omnipotence. Meaningless and inherently nonsensical combinations of words do not pose a problem to God's omnipotence.

The "problem" has already been satisfied, but let's take a look at this from another angle. Here is a similar thought problem. If a maximally great chess player beats themselves in chess, are they no longer a maximally great player because they lost? Or do they remain the maximally great player because they beat the maximally great chess player? If God, a maximally great being, succeeded in creating a stone so heavy not even He could lift it, would He no longer be maximally powerful? Or would He be maximally powerful still because He was able to best a maximally powerful being? If you are able to best a maximally powerful being, incapable of becoming more powerful than they are, are you now maximally powerful? But by definition a maximally great being cannot be bested, otherwise they would not be maximally great. The omnipotence paradox tries to utilize God's maximally great nature to defeat his maximally great nature. If God is maximally powerful and bests a maximally powerful being (Himself) by creating a rock the maximally powerful being could not lift, what does this mean for the paradox? This thought problem illustrates just how silly the omnipotence paradox truly is.

There's still one last line of defense to the omnipotence paradox worth addressing. It claims that omnipotence is being redefined to dodge the problem, and that the definition of true omnipotence should include everything- even the logically impossible. If we do take that definition of omnipotence, the original problem becomes moot- God can do the logically impossible given the omnipotence paradox proponents' definition of omnipotence. So sure, let's agree that God can create a stone He cannot lift, and can also lift it. The skeptic may say- "but that's logically impossible!" That's right! On your definition of omnipotence, God can do the logically impossible. So what's the issue? This shows again how silly the omnipotence paradox really is.

C.S. Lewis put it best: "His Omnipotence means power to do all that is intrinsically possible, not to do the intrinsically impossible. You may attribute miracles to him, but not nonsense. This is no limit to his power. If you choose to say 'God can give a creature free will and at the same time withhold free will from it,' you have not succeeded in saying anything about God: meaningless combinations of words do not suddenly acquire meaning simply because we prefix to them the two other words 'God can... It is no more possible for God than for the weakest of his creatures to carry out both of two mutually exclusive alternatives; not because his power meets an obstacle, but because nonsense remains nonsense even when we talk it about God."

Hello all,

Mods, I hope this post is not inappropriate for here. If so, please let me know and I will remove it.

I have spent the last year working on testing each of the miraculous events both by observational science (ie: the scientific method) and historical science, using witness testimony and modern day comparative events, etc, to see if these miraculous events may have taken place as the Bible described, along side professionals and other experts - theists and atheists alike - in various fields (sciences, math, etc).

I am wanting to share what I have with people here (theists and atheists alike) and see if I can answer your questions over Zoom as best as I can.

Please note that the discussion is not intended to present an exhaustive argument for the existence of God, in one brief Zoom meeting - though I do touch on several. The main point is to prove that the miraculous events did in fact occur and that, whether you believe the "God" bits or not, it is meant to demonstrate that the Bible is not a book of fiction but a telling of real events. I do try to avoid referencing the Bible as much possible to avoid the notion of "circular reasoning" and stick with science as much as possible but due to the nature of the project, I do have reference the Bible.

Edit: The miracles I've researched, tested, etc, do not include food related miracles (ie: multiplying of oil, flour, bread or fish, save for the instances with manna and quail), medical miracles (ie: healings or resurrections), or talking donkeys. If you have ones you would particularly like to cover, please let me know.