I have been a “believer” ever since I can remember. Most clearly a sense at the age of seven that I was bad and Jesus could make me good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now (2022) on the cusp of 70 years of age I find myself asking “What am I meant to believe?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I hear and read all sorts of opinions around whether the Bible is the absolute truth or whether it was “of its time” and needs to be re-interpreted. Most pertinently perhaps, was Paul so influenced by his Judaism that he was blinded to the full implications of Grace? Was he continuing to see as “Sin” things which God now considered “acceptable”? Worse still perhaps that we misinterpret words and cultural contexts. This has huge implications when “the world” is calling such beliefs “Hate speech” and where we are fast moving towards having such beliefs made illegal and the preaching of them a criminal offence<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me illustrate the challenge with one example. Jesus himself refers to Noah <\/strong>and the flood <\/strong>as if they were historic events<\/strong>, but many today would argue that was a myth<\/strong>. But if it was a myth we lose a very important example of how God feels about sin <\/strong>and has in times past dealt with it unequivocably.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What about the destruction of Sodom<\/strong>. Did that really occur and what precisely was God angry about<\/strong>?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there is creation itself. Does it matter that God took billions of years<\/strong> to gradually evolve life as we know it today? Well yes, because to accept billions of years leads us to believe that man “evolved<\/em>” from less developed apes and reject the concept of God creating mankind<\/strong> as a unique event, i.e. in Adam and Eve<\/strong>. The consequences of that are that we erradicate the very events that led to sin <\/strong>coming into the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n If man has not sinned, Christ had no need to die for that sin in an “atoning sacrifice<\/em>“. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In short the Bible and Christian theology falls apart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am apparently not alone as this article “What is our theology<\/a>?” indicates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n