“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely not darkness in him. If we say, ‘We have fellowship with him,’ and yet we walk in darkness, we are lying and are not practicing the truth. If we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
Light is pretty powerful stuff. The list of things it can do runs far longer than a single blog post could handle. It is necessary for life. Without light there is no life. There would be no beauty. Everything would be dark. There’s a reason light was the first thing God spoke into existence. Light is also a revealer of what’s true. Our youngest dressed up like a detective for school yesterday. To complete the ensemble, he made sure to bring his trusty invisible ink pen along with him. When you write with the pen you can’t see any evidence that you’ve made a mark until you use your trusty UV light pen to reveal what’s really there. What’s true on paper physically, is also true in our lives more metaphorically. Just because it is a metaphor, though, doesn’t make it any less real. Let’s talk today about God’s light and seeing what’s really there.
The reason I’m thinking about this at all is because about thirty years ago, some builder decided to situate our house such that the afternoon sun comes pouring in through the front door. We never really got to experience the full benefit of this until we added a storm door to our front door a few months ago. Now, we can open the door and let the sunshine in as The 5th Dimension once sang.
Personally, I love this. I love having as much natural light in the house as we possibly can. And when that natural light comes packaged with direct sunlight, all the better. In the mornings the sun shines in through our dining room windows such that I can sit eating breakfast with the sun right in my eyes. I love it. The one drawback to our late afternoon sunshine, though, is that we have hardwood floors through the living room and dining room which are connected by a direct path from the front door.
We try to keep a pretty clean house. With three boys, two of whom are teenagers, all living under the same roof, there are times when this is a bit more Herculean of a task than others, but we at least make it our goal. At least part of the reason for this is personality. Personality-wise, I lean a bit in the OCD direction. If I can see the dirt, I tend to immediately get it tidied up. I have to. If you understand, you understand.
Well, when that sun comes pouring in through the full glass storm door in the later afternoons, sending rays shooting across our hardwood floors, every single piece of dust and dirt on at least that strip of the floor is brilliantly illuminated. All of them. The picture at the top of the page today is one I took the other afternoon. We had just vacuumed all the hard floors only a day before, but when I opened the front door and the sun came streaming in the day, you could suddenly see that the floors which had looked nice and clean before then were absolutely filthy. Everything in my world stopped until I could sweep it all up.
Jesus’ best friend, John, once wrote that God is light. He was mostly speaking metaphorically, of course. Just because he was being metaphorical, though, doesn’t make what he said any less true. Just like light is the source of life physically speaking, God is the source of life spiritually speaking. His Spirit is what allows growth to happen in our lives. He nourishes our souls. He creates the possibility of beauty. He is always a revealer of what is.
The closer we draw near to Him, the more we are able to experience His light. Apart from that light, we can easily convince ourselves that we are doing just fine. Sure, there are some little things going on here and there in our lives that we aren’t thrilled with, but on the whole we’re good. I mean, no, we don’t have all the friends we would like to have, but everyone is lonely these days, aren’t they? How many governments and international health bodies now have declared loneliness to be an epidemic? And, okay fine, all our relationships aren’t perfect, but they’re mostly good. We can be around our mom or dad or grandparents or children without things getting but so tense. Yes, yes, there are certain subjects we have learned to avoid, but everybody has those. We’re doing fine. We don’t need religion as a crutch to help us get through life like all those poor slobs who can’t seem to make it on their own. An invisible man in the sky isn’t going to do anything for us we can’t already do for ourselves.
That’s a place where so many people live. And it seems fine. Most of the time. But every now and then something happens that pulls back the curtain and let’s just a little bit of God’s light shine through. Often this is a moment of tragedy of some kind. Something happens that is way beyond what we know how to control. We don’t even begin to have the resources, physical or otherwise, to deal with it. And all of a sudden where everything once seemed to be just fine, we can see just how much of a mess it really is.
We can respond to this in one of two ways. We can draw the curtains back closed and keep on pretending that everything is just fine, or we can walk further into the light and get the help we need to clean up the mess the light revealed. Now, I admittedly don’t have any idea how you can ignore a mess once you have seen it, but that’s my personality. At the same time, though, if you can pull those curtains closed or shut that door again quickly enough the mess seems to disappear just as magically as it appeared. And once you can’t see something, living like it’s not really there gets pretty easy pretty quickly.
Yet just because we can’t see the mess anymore doesn’t mean it has gone away in actuality. And the thing about a mess is that it doesn’t tend to clean itself. No, the opposite is more accurately the case. The longer you leave it alone, the bigger it gets until you finally can’t ignore it. Cleaning it up at that point is usually a whole lot harder than it would have been if you had just let the light in and dealt with it in the first place.
God wants us to experience life that is abundant and full. Places that are dark and broken in our lives, though, prevent us from accessing the full measure of what He wants to give us. He gives us the gift of His light – His justice and righteousness and holiness – as a means of helping us see the places in our lives where brokenness abounds. This isn’t a fun experience in any given moment, but if we will take up the courage to remain in His light, He will help us see those places cleaned up and restored. If we will then continue to live in the light of His presence, we will be able to see the messes that invariably come creeping into our lives when they are still small and before they get to the point that they are going to cause us trouble, and get them addressed with His help.
And when we do this, we don’t have to keep telling ourselves we’re fine in hopes that we’ll eventually believe it as much as the people around us do because we really will be. That’s what John was getting at there at the end. “If we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” When we walk in the God’s light, when we open the door and the blinds and turn on all the overhead lights so there aren’t any more dark places in us where sin can quietly (at first) flourish, God’s righteousness floods the scene and things are better than they were before. Our relationship with Him is right as we receive the forgiveness and sanctification made available by Jesus’ sacrifice. Our relationship with other people is made right too as we live toward them with graciousness and kindness and humility and love.
Getting into the light is never fun nor particularly easy. But when we get there and stay there, life is better. May you walk in the light today and experience the good you won’t find anywhere else.
The Nexus 
I’m not actually walking, or working in the light at the moment. Too darn hot to be honest. Pushing 30c.
Otherwise feeling pretty good today. Liverpool beat Sparta Prague 5-1 in the Europa league round of 16 last night, the weather is bright and a little breezy, I harvested a nice crop of chillis which I will be cooking this evening when work is wrapped up.
My only reservation about “getting into the light” is concern about sunburn. Otherwise, we’re good!
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I had more sunburns growing up than I care to count. I layer on spf 100 when I go to the beach and sit in the shade if I’m not in the water. No sunburns for me anymore. And, yes, 86 is well beyond my comfort zone. It’ll max out at 65 here today.
But, yes, when a skeptic engages with an argument that only makes sense from a Christian frame of reference, it will indeed seem odd and probably mockable. I can appreciate that.
If my Jayhawks can get a win over Houston tomorrow, I’ll be having a pretty good day too. That’s U.S. college basketball. Go Arsenal 😉
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I too have experienced some pretty awful sunburns. Once I even burned the soles of my feet when I dozed off on a beach at a place called Park Rynie with my feet resting on a boulder.
My mate and I were roughing it for a few days soon after I first arrived in South Africa. He was fishing and it was a cloudy day, not a glimmer of sunshine. We slept on the beach and had a 5km hike to meet up with friends the following day.
I was more sick than I ever recall, before or since.
I avoid direct sunshine like the plague!
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On a spring break missions trip in college, I started the week burning my shoulders and back and arms to a crisp. I suffered all week. Then, on the last day, we went to the beach again. I lathered sunscreen everywhere…except the top of my feet. They were as red as a cherry for a full week and it was at least a week before I could put on a pair of shoes. I went barefoot all over campus—to class and church and everywhere—for a week. They tried to nickname me Chief Redfoot.
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Experience is a great if sometimes painful teacher.
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It is that.
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As for engaging…
If what is being taught is not understood by the pupil whose at fault?
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Depends on if the student actually wants to learn what is being taught.
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This can be the case.
However, if the lesson requires the pupil to be threatened then ultimately, how good is the lesson?
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I don’t think I issued any threats, did I?
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To me, no, of course not. But the tacit threat of eternal damnation is built into vour religion.
According to the doctrine you preach/ teach I, as a non-believer, am ultimately doomed, am I not?
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I guess that depends on what you mean by “doomed.”
I am very much of the opinion that the language used by Jesus and other New Testament authors was hyperbolic and metaphorical. I’ve been preaching that for a very long time. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be taken seriously, but I don’t think they should be taken literally. In the end, God will indeed hold everyone accountable for their choices. For those who have chosen to be with Him by accepting Jesus’ atoning death and life-giving resurrection as efficacious, they’ll receive the end of their choice: life with Him. For those who have not, He will not force Himself on them as that would be unloving. Instead, they’ll be given what they desire: a place to dwell entirely apart from Him. Because He is the source of life, it will be a place devoid of life. Because He is the source of light, it will be a place of darkness. Because He is the source of all good, it will be a place devoid of anything good. What exactly it will be like, we don’t really know because neither Jesus nor any of the other guys were speaking literally. The most we can say is that it certainly isn’t intended to be a reward for anything and that it probably won’t be much like a day at the beach…except perhaps the beaches we’ve been to and gotten sunburnt (I kid).
Personally, I’ve never had that presented to me as a threat. I don’t think of it as a threat. I’ve certainly never knowingly presented it to anyone else as a threat (especially my kids; I absolutely don’t want them thinking in those terms, because if they are going to stick with the decisions to follow Jesus they have thus far made, I don’t want it to be even remotely because of a fear of Hell). I don’t even think Jesus or the other guys meant it to be a threat. It’s simply a description of reality. If someone ultimately chooses to follow Jesus, great That decision will come with a set of consequences. If they don’t, that decision will also come with a set of consequences, and it won’t be for a lack of God’s trying to convince them otherwise.
It is certainly true that lots and lots of preachers and evangelists over the years have used the reality of Hell as a threatening tool to emotionally goad often weak-minded people (and worse yet, children) into making professions of faith, but I think all such methods are underhanded and manipulative and should in no ways be used to communicate the Gospel with another person. Fear-based decisions like that rarely prove to be genuine and have often led to more harm in a person’s life than good. The deconversion stories you referenced before would be a pretty good example of that.
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So, as a non-believer you do or do not consider I am hell bound ( depending upon your own version of Hell of course) when I pop my clogs?
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Absent a willingness to accept Jesus’ claims to be the Messiah and to place your faith in Him as Lord, that’s the ultimate and just end of all people. God doesn’t force Himself. If someone chooses not to be with Him, He’ll let them make that choice. It would not be loving to force someone into a situation they don’t want to be in, wouldn’t you agree?
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Just?
The notion of hell is a church construct of course but to consider the billions of non Christians, past present and future, billions who ard kids, who lack belief solely because of their culture and geographical location they were born does not sound just at all!
Such a response comes across as from one who is thoroughly indoctrinated.
And of course the character Jesus of Nazareth said nothing about Hell as determined / described by the church.
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I didn’t say I accepted everything the church has ever said about Hell over its history. Much of that has been sensationalized and isn’t terribly consistent with what we actually find in the text.
Your mentioning the bit about culture and geographic location reminds me: What do you do with people who become followers of Jesus in the midst of cultural and geographic contexts where Christianity is not only not the dominant religion, but in which becoming a follower of Jesus is all but a death sentence? What do you do with stories from Muslims in particular who became followers of Jesus without having ever met a Christian (by their own confession) and because they had a dream in which they encountered someone whom they somehow knew to be Jesus, and soon thereafter renounced their formerly committed Muslim faith in favor of Christianity with the full knowledge that their family would likely try to murder them for it?
My point is that while culture and geography obviously have an impact on the faith a person chooses, it’s far from the sole determining factor.
And on the justness of the thing, if the apostle Paul is right (and I obviously think he is while you don’t), no one is going to reach that point without having had the opportunity to choose otherwise. That would be unjust of Him.
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What do I say?
How did the missionary avoid being eaten, or killed?
A Muslim who had never met a Christian?
Well, I had never ( knowingly) met an atheist until I had access to the internet.
Of course location isn’t the sole determining factor.
But how would Chinese kids become obese because of eating Macdonald’s and Kentucky etc if they never encountered a fast good restaurant?
There you go defending hell and eternal damnation again just because the character Paul supposedly said it.
SMH.
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Highly recommend this fascinating article.
Definitely something to ponder while you munch your cornflakes!
😊
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Interesting, yes. Persuasive, not particularly. You have to ignore too much archaeological evidence of a detailed knowledge of a much more ancient world than the Hellenistic period to which these much later authors would not likely have had access.
And it was a combination of Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Lucky Charms this morning. There wasn’t a full bowl of either.
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By the way, did you give any more thought to Dilahunty’s challenge ( on that phone-in) about any non biblical evidence to verify the resurrection claims?
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I didn’t need to. I’ve already acknowledged more than once that the resurrection isn’t mentioned outside of the Gospels and Acts and the other New Testament letters by any contemporary sources. But, given that the relevant sources are historically sound, that’s not necessary.
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Sorry, yes, you did say this. I forgot
So your premise being, to paraphrase…
“We don’t need evidence to support the resurrection claim. As I believe the gospels to be historically sound and trustworthy the resurrection claim must also be sound and trustworthy. ”
How’s that? Did I get it right?
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Not quite. Because the Gospels and Acts are historical, they furnish sufficient evidence to support the reasonableness of the historical claim that Jesus rose from the dead.
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They are ancient historical texts, yes, but are more accurately described as historical fiction, especially Acts.
This does not in any way provide evidence to verify the claim that the character Jesus of Nazareth rose from the deadirore.
No historian I am aware of will claim there is evidence of the resurrection.
Therefore, what remains?. Well, it is obvious all we have is faith.
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On what grounds do you consider Acts to be an historical fiction?
I feel like I keep saying the same thing in response to the second part. I don’t suspect it’ll take this time either, but we’ll go there again.
If your only standard is that empirical evidence is the only evidence that can be considered (which is the result of a philosophical commitment to empiricism which may or may not be a correct philosophical position to take, but that’s not something that can be determined by scientific means as it is a pre-scientific claim), then no, you are not going to find empirical evidence for the resurrection. And we both agree that I haven’t claimed as much. Given that the Gospels and Acts are reliable historical documents, however, the most reasonable conclusion of the historical facts they present is that Jesus rose from the dead. Is there ultimately faith in that conclusion? Of course there is. But given the available evidence, it is nonetheless the most reasonable conclusion.
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As for the article, I understood the premise to be that the author by way of comparison with other cultural histories / biblical authors ‘constructed’ certain aspects of, their history to fit their own personal/national/ tribal narrative to justify certain actions?
Maybe I misunderstood?
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That’s certainly a convenient charge to be able to make from the standpoint of skepticism, I just don’t think there’s enough evidence to support the claim. You have to do a whole lot of maybe-they-meant-thising and maybe-they-meant-thating, and a whole lot of squinting to find similarities in sources that otherwise have to many differences in worldview outlook to really be drawing from the same places or seeking to achieve the same ends for that thesis to work. The simpler approach is to just take the authors on their own terms rather than trying to filter them through the lens of another historical period. In spite of some broad similarities, the worldview being espoused by the Scriptures is just too different from the various pagan worldviews across the ancient world to have been a copy in some form or fashion.
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What evidence is there to support the veracity of the larger than life biblical tales?
We know the Noachian tale is myth borrowed from earlier narratives.
As we know the Exodus narrative is geopolitical oitucak foundation myth.
And we can consider the ficticious Jesus geneologies which seem to mirror the ancient practice of tracing one’s ancestry to a hero from the past.
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We’ve already talked about those. We keep going in circles here. While there are certainly lots of guesses about the origins of the story of the Flood, to say we have specific knowledge about that to enable us to make a pronouncement like that is to overstate the case.
This is a helpful summary of some major archaeological evidence pointing toward the reasonableness of the conclusion that the Exodus narrative is historical: https://www.biblearchaeology.org/research/chronological-categories/exodus-era/4919-top-ten-discoveries-related-to-moses-and-the-exod
Jesus’ genealogies in Matthew and Luke were written for two different reasons for two different audiences. Both fit the patterns of genealogical recording of the day. Neither would have been considered unhistorical or fictitious by the original recipients.
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No overstating at all. Science informs us there was no global flood as described in the Noachian tale. And this is without touching on the nonsense of the animals or carpentry skills of the protagonist.
It is somewhat disconcerting that you continue to assert a YEC / literalist and definitely unscientific approach to this tale.
It tends to cause a raised eyebrow or two which leads to any number of doubts regarding credibility over other biblical tales.
Re: Exodus. Windle is a Pastor not an archeologist. That on it’s own should be enough. However…
There is also his unfounded presumptions, not least of which: Moses was literate, being educated in Pharoah’s household which tells us ol he did / could have written the Pentateuch.
Oh my goodness!
Do you wonder why I raise my eyebrows?
” Neither would have been considered unhistorical or fictitious by the original recipients.”
Quite likely, but this does not make it any less likely to be erroneous but merely adds credence to the article I referenced.
To paraphrase Life of Brian: “They made it up as they went along”
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It doesn’t make it any more likely either.
As for Windle, I’m curious why his being a pastor is relevant. Does that mean he hasn’t done his homework there properly? Are his facts in error?
As for the carpentry skills of Noah, ancient people built all manner of amazing things. That’s not a good argument against the Flood.
I’ve already told you I accept those stories as historical. I’m not sure why my continuing to make reference to them surprises you. Besides, you are the one who continues bringing them up over and over again as if that’s somehow a total defeater of Christianity. Even if those stories were all historical inventions (I don’t think they were, but for the sake of argument), that doesn’t have any bearing on whether or not Jesus rose from the dead and that’s the only question that ultimately matters when it comes to Christianity.
We can continue to parse out and debate this set of stories, but it’s not really going to do either of us any good.
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Humour me…
When you say you accept the stories as historical do you consider the stories as presented as historical fact, they happened as described.
Start with the Noachian Flood.
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I’ll be glad to, but you aren’t going to like it. Yes, I think the basic contours of the story of the Flood are historical. Do I think it was absolutely a globalized catastrophe? I’m not as sure on that. Given the understanding of the size and scope of the world at the time, it could have been a devastating more still more regional flood, But, yes, I think the basic story is broadly historical. Yes, I know you’ll give me the full litany of reasons it can’t possibly be historical, and I don’t totally discredit those by any means. But – and this is where faith comes into play to a certain degree – I am willing to extend the benefit of the doubt to stories like that on the basis of the number of stories and characters that were once thought to be 100% false only to later be proven correct by subsequent archaeological finds.
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And do you consider dinosaurs were on the Ark as well, even if only a few eggs or babies?
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Nope. I think the timing on a flood was only a few thousand years ago at most. Dinosaurs were tens of millions of years ago. But then your question seems like it was meant to be pejorative as I have already said I disagree with much of Ken Ham’s position, most notably on the age of the Earth and the universe.
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So, of all the hundreds maybe thousands of geologists, geophysicists, oceanographers, meteorologists, biologists etc (not mention goodness’ knows how many Bible scholars) who have studied such phenomena all their academic lives and have produced volumous evidence that has shown the Noachian flood did not happen you consider the Genesis description to be a reasonably accurate portrayal of a genuine historical event.
Interesting.
I have a blog pal called Colorstorm who is, like you, a devout Christian and while we disagree on any number of things, as you can well, imagine, he, like you, is still erudite, never moderates my comments no matter how heated out chats sometimes get, and from what he writes comes across as affable and reasonably intelligent.
And just when you think all is hunky dory he put up a post explaining why the earth is a disc and how humanity has been duped, and asking such questions as :Why was Walt Disney brought on board bt NASA during the Apollo missions? ( Yes, he also considers the moon landings to be faked, I am being perfectly serious, he truly does! )
So, you can imagine how my brain reacts and my mouth forms in to wtf expression when I read anything that asserts the Noachian Global Flood tale is fact, whether YEC or OEC. At the same time my eyes tend to roll upwards and I have to really bite my tongue not to reply in a manner that might be construed as insinuating my interlocuter is more than a few sandwiches short of a picnic.
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If you’ve interacted with folks like that, I suspect you would be pretty prone do that kind of a reaction. I don’t blame you at all. I would be too if I were you! Rest assured, while the moon is absolutely made of cheese, we totally landed on it (see what I did there?). I kid. I’d like to think I’m not a wide-eyed conspiracy theorist (except for the aliens in Roswell, but other than that…I kid, I kid.), but I also recognize that some of the things in the Scriptures for which I am willing to extend the benefit of the doubt for reasons that, while informed by evidence, are ultimately positions of faith seem crazy to someone who thinks the whole thing is crazy from the start. I don’t blame you for being a bit suspicious.
Thankfully, when it comes to following Jesus, you don’t have to sign on the dotted line of any of that. There’s only the question of whether or not He rose from the grave. That’s a big, I know, but it’s perhaps a little less of a stretch to demand than accepting the whole thing from the start. As a case in point, there are many Christians who are every bit as committed to Christ as I am, but who share something more like your position on the question of some of these Old Testament stories. That doesn’t mean I don’t think they are more likely mistaken than not, but in the end, those questions don’t matter nearly so much as the important one, so we can get along and work toward the same ultimate end.
On the consensus of all those scholars, are there really that many who have actively researched the question? I figured there would have been quite a few, but that high of a number surprises me. That being said, while certainly not on this kind of a magnitude, the scholarly consensus has been against one historical claim or another of the Scriptures before and they have eventually been proven correct. The historical existence of King David being one of them. Who’s to say something won’t yet be found demonstrating the historicity of these accounts? That’s a position of faith, no doubt, but so is the position that it won’t be. It’s simply faith in different outcomes.
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The good old theological two step.
It’s a little amusing that while Christians of various sects/ denominations will excuse each other’s foibles about any number of Bible interpretations the one that is sacrosanct seems to be the resurrection.
Is this is why Christadelphians for example are not regarded by the mainstream as Christian?
If you refuse to accept the science that refutes the notion of a global flood as per the Noachian tale then you are in essence raising the middle finger to all those scientists who work in the related fields, much of whose work we use in our daily lives.
To clarify, with any necessary apology, I did not actually mean there have been hundreds or thousands of geologists etc who have specifically worked on the Noachian Flood tale, but rather their work shows that such a global event as portrayed in the bible is an impossibility.
Flood geology is a unique field confined to the disingenious arsehats who preach YEC.
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Of course the resurrection is the central piece. If Jesus didn’t rise from the dead, then He was a deranged liar and the whole thing is a fraud. As we’ve already talked about, though, Paul said as much.
You seem to like raising red herrings when I’m making a point you don’t seem entirely sure how to deal with. We’ve already talked about the Christadelphians. They’re not relevant to our present conversation. They are considered to be non-Christian by the mainstream of orthodox believers because they believe God is a unity while the historically orthodox position is that He is a Trinity. He might be one or the other (I think the latter), but He can’t be both. Either they are rightly called Christians, or we are, but to refer to both groups as Christians isn’t correct.
I’m not raising a middle finger at all. I have great respect for them and the work they’ve done. I simply think there may yet be a discovery that shows they missed something or perhaps interpreted the relevant data incorrectly (an honest mistake, to be sure) or through the lens of their worldview rather than with unfiltered objectivity as has happened before with other issues related to the historicity of the Scriptures. I don’t think their efforts are dishonest or in vain. I simply think they may not have been able to see the whole picture yet.
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No red herring, merely highlighting what on the face of it seems like a degree of hypocrisy.
The Christadelphians naturally consider you to be the non-Christians, which when considered in light of the fact the Trinity is a church invented doctrine some may regard your view as heretical. Funny how things turn out sometimes, don’t you think so?
Obviously the flipoff to geologists was metaphorical but as your somewhat uneducated view clashes head on with accepted scientific evidence of how the world works in this regard and as the ramifications of disregarding the scientific evidence can be catastrophic you might be able to appreciate why such a view as you hold would generally be regarded as somewhat left field, shall we say
Biting my tongue a bit here.
As an afterthought, which I probably should have raised before, how do you reckon all the animals managed to get on board? Things like kangaroos, tapirs, cassowarys, elephants etc?
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It is funny how things turn out. I agree with you there.
The Trinity isn’t a church-invented doctrine, though. It developed really early on in the history of the church from those early believers’ wrestling with understanding the teaching of Jesus and the clear revealing of God’s nature as not unitary. It was the major position of the church on the matter from incredibly early on and was eventually formalized to draw a clear line of distinction between the majority position and a whole slew of options that didn’t accord well with the Biblical record.
I didn’t say we should disregard all the scientific evidence. I simply think it should be held with more humility than you seem to do. That being said, I can absolutely see how it seems like my view seems to ship me off to left field from your perspective. I’m rather impressed with your tongue biting. I hope you didn’t leave a sore 😉
On the animals on the ark…I wish I knew. Assuming that really happened for the moment, that would have been quite a spectacle! Here’s the thing, though, if the God I believe in really exists, it’s not like that would have been hard for Him. I mean, if you can create the world and everything in it, what’s moving a bunch of animals around? I don’t think we should wave the miracle or mystery flag unless we have to as a general rule, but rather am okay trusting that even if I don’t understand how God did something, He still could have done it somehow. Thankfully, even if the whole thing didn’t really happen that way, it doesn’t have any impact on whether or not Jesus rose from the dead.
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