How to Stay Christian in CollegeHow to Stay Christian in College
His Needs, Her Needs: Building an Affair Proof Marriage by Willard F. Harley, Jr.
I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheistby Norman L. Geisler and Frank Turek
I finally finished reading this book cover to cover. While I got an overview of it during my Apologetics course at Big Sky Bible Institute, I decided to go back through and read the entire thing word-for-word.
This is an excellent book! If you want to know why you believe what you believe, are looking for evidence to back up your faith or refute people posing hard questions, or are an atheist searching for truth, this book is a great place to start looking!
At 447 pages, it may look a little long at first, but I think that this book strikes a great balance between being too short and simplistic, and too long and wordy. They include great quotations, awesome facts, easy to read charts, and parable-like stories to aid understanding. These guys back up their facts and quotations with excellent citations, but still write in easy to understand english. Basically, they say really smart things and you can understand it.
A little bit about the authors: Norman Geisler has authored or coauthored over sixty books, has taught at the university and graduate level for over 40 years, and has debated in all 50 states and 25 countries, has a Ph.D. in philosophy, and is president of a seminary. Frank Turek has two masters, and (at the time of publication) is going for a doctorate of apologetics. He's vice president of the same seminary as Geisler (Southern Evangelical Seminary), and is a renowned writer and speaker.
Here is the general thought process that the book follows, and the points that it consequently proves beyond a reasonable doubt:
1. Truth about reality is knowable.
2. The opposite of true is false.
3. It is true that the theistic God exists. This is evidenced by the:
a. Beginning of the universe (Cosmological Argument)
b. Design of the universe (Teleological Argument/anthropic principle)
c. Design of Life (telological argument)
d. Moral Law (moral argument)
4. If God exists, then miracles are possible.
5. Miracles can be used to confirm a message from God (i.e., as acts of God to confirm a word from God)
6. The New Testament is historically reliable. This is evidenced by:
a. Early testimony
b. Eyewitness testimony
c. Uninvented (authentic) testimony
d. Eyewitnesses who were not deceived
7. The New Testament says Jesus claimed to be God.
8. Jesus' claim to be God was miraculously confirmed by:
a. His fulfillment of many prophecies about himself;
b. His sinless life and miraculous deeds;
c. His predictions and accomplishments of his resurrection.
9. Therefore, Jesus is God
10 Whatever Jesus (who is God) teaches is true
11. Jesus taught the Bible is the Word of God.
12. Therefore, it is true that the Bible is the Word of God (and anything opposed to it is false)
And I love how Geisler and Turek quote loads of atheist sources that support their points...
(Read this book online on Google Books)
I really like the statistic in bold (found in 3 places above). Gives a great perspective of the vastness of the work, effort, and study that went into JUST the writing of the books (inspired, of course), not to mention the immense work that took place to fastidiously copy them and translate and transmit them down to us. Incredible how God has created and protected this precious love-letter to us!
"While the major works of the New Testament were immediately seen as authentic by these early church fathers, most of the New Testament was accepted before A.D. 200, and all of it was officially and finally recognized as authentic by the Council of Hippo in 393. (p. 368) (From Geisler and Nix, General Introduction to the Bible, 294)
"...of about 40 authors over nearly 1,500 years to get his message across." (p. 372)
In fact, our conclusion on inerrancy would be falsified if someone could trace a real error back to an original scroll. (17) But to this day, after nearly 2,000 years of looking, no one has found such an irreconcilable problem. (This is truly amazing when you consider that the Bible is really a collection of documents written by about 40 authors over a 1,500-year period. Where could you find such agreement on a variety of issues from 40 authors who all live today, much less over a 1,500-year period?)
(17): Copyist errors have been found in manuscripts, but they are easily identified and known not to be in the original by comparing the many manuscripts in existence (see chapter 9). While no Bible originals have yet been found, earlier manuscripts of other works have survived. So it is possible that a Bible original may someday be discovered.
