Hi to my Forum Friends,
Over and over, in the discussion "Book Of Mark... Fiction?" begun by our atheist Friend, Deep, I have seen people post that there is no evidence of God. And, that faith is blind, no evidence. Nothing could be further from the truth. There is an abundance of evidence for both.
Answered prayer is solid reason for faith -- and solid evidence that God is real. And, it is proof that He answers the prayers of His children, Christian believers. He does not answer prayers for non-believers -- for why should they be asking Him for anything? They don't believe in Him. However, once they do sincerely pray the one prayer He will hear from them -- the prayer to receive Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior -- then, God hears and answers ALL their prayers.
Of course, the non-believers will laugh at this truth, for they have never had a prayer answered by God. If I had never seen a sunset -- I most likely would not believe it to be so beautiful either. But, once my eyes have been opened, once I have spiritual eyes, I can see -- and, in seeing, I have faith. And, then I KNOW that God is real.
Fulfilled prophecy is solid reason for faith and for belief in God. In the Bible, Old Testament and New Testament, there are 1817 prophecies. ALL except the prophecies of the End Times, of His return to rapture His church, the Tribulation, His Second Coming, and Eternity -- have been fulfilled. This is proven by both religious and secular sources.
Consider this. Looking at prophecies about Jesus Christ, it is estimated that the chance of one man fulfilling eight prophecies is one in 10^17. That is "1 chance in --- 100,000,000,000,000,000" -- for only 8 fulfilled prophecies.
In the Bible, there are over 300 prophecies about Jesus Christ. Can you imagine how many zeroes it would take to write that number? How about the number of zeroes to represent 1800 fulfilled prophecies?
Yet, the only prophecies left to be fulfilled are those few about the End Times. And, not one single prophecy from the Bible has failed to happen just as it was written. The Bible has 100% accuracy in fulfilled prophecies. In the natural world that could not happen -- no matter what seer or psychic one might visit. But, it does happen, supernaturally, with God and His Written Word, the Bible.
I explain all this and much more in four PowerPoint presentations I have created. In 2005, my daughter, Lana, was taking a World Religion class at our local junior college to get her final credit to graduate with her B.S. degree in Business. For extra credit, she asked me speak to her class. For this, I prepared the PowerPoint presentation titled "It All Began With Creation."
Since then, I have created other PowerPoint presentations for Bible studies. If anyone would like me to e-mail copies to you, please send me a Private Message with your e-mail address. The four that I can send you now are:
Inaugural Class - We Believe
It All Began With Creation
End Times Bible Study - Week One
End Times Bible Study - Week Two
My Friends, God is real -- and He is definitely in the Saving Business. He is not an impersonal God as those who follow deism, pantheism, polytheism, and other world religions would tell you. Our God, the God of the Bible, is personal (very personal), present, and active in our lives, in our world, and in the universe -- every minute of every day
2 Peter 3:9, "The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance."
His personal promises to YOU:
HAVE eternal life: John 3:15, John 3:16, John 5:39, John 6:40, 1 John 5:13
HAS eternal life: John 3:36, John 5:24, John 6:47
So, to my non-believing Friends, I offer this: Hebrews 12:1-2, "Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the a u t h or and perfecter of faith. . ."
God bless, have a wonderful, blessed day,
Bill
