Apologetics, that’s a funny word. What does it mean? Well it is being able to answer questions and maybe objections about your faith, and it is something that the Word instructs us to do and be prepared for.
1 Peter 3:15-16
“But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.”
Well, why do I bring this up now after such a long pause in my ramblings here? I was talking with a friend (Dave G) online and lo and behold he also has a website where he does apologetics posts. Wonderful stuff! https://www.legatichristi.org/. And then he told me of yet another site he enjoys on the subject, https://coldcasechristianity.com/, and this site even has podcasts if you want soemthing to listen to when you are unable to read. Lastly our conversations eventually led us to the Great Commission and spreading the Gospel and reaching souls for Christ and that reminded me of my favorite method, designed by Bill Fay. He designed “How can I share my faith without and argument?”, which has both a booklet you can get here and an audio track to listen to, which you can find here.
All these resources are definitely worth checking out and my hope is that they will help you be prepared and comfortable enough that you, too, can participate in the Great Commission as we are supposed to as Christians.
Matthew 28:19-20
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Here it comes!
Now is the time to get in on the fun or bring new people to the site!
New year and many topics planned. Here is just a short list and if you have any comments or suggestions, now would be the time @ Linc at ReverendLinc dot com!
- What do they believe?
Major religions of the world and what thir core tenets are.
- Which version of the Bible is the right one?
There are so many versions of the Bible, how do you know which one to use and what are the differences.
- Thou Shaly Not Judge.
Clarification of the single most mis-quoted verse of the Bible.
Which Demomination is the right one?
In order to understand the real answer on this we need to have a bit of a history lesson:
Christianity really started around 20AD. From that time until 1053AD what evolved was a centralized church. This centralized church developed some political doctrines and some “bosses” or church heads, and depending on where you lived, there were different bosses. The boss in the eastern portion of the church was the patriarch Michael Cerularius and the boss in the west (controlled by Rome) was Pope Leo IX.
The big disagreement here was over who was the real boss, what kind of bread to use for communion, a small change in the wording of the Nicene creed, celebacy of religious leaders and purgatory, among other political views. There was a great split that occurred, or what we call “The great schism” where 2 giant religious factions were created, the Eastern Orthodox church and the Roman Catholic church. The head of each faction excommunicated one another just for spite.
Later on, in 1517, a Saxony (now Germany) priest named Martin Luther was fed up with some of the corruption and political involvements of the Roman Catholic church (selling absolutions, etc) and came up with 95 theses which he nailed to the church doors in protest. This was really the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. The people who followed Martin Luther were called “Lutherans”.
As the reformation spread across countries other reformers ideas cropped up and their followers, of course, broke off into further factions or “denominations”. These denominations were originally largely regional but today are almost all world wide. While the differences between all those denominations are interesting and sometimes heated, by and large, they all teach salvation through Christ by faith and the Bible as God’s word.
And that leaves us at today where there are many many Protestant “denominations” a person can belong to and 2 “Catholic” churches. So that brings us back to our original question, which one is the right one? Which denomination?
Given that your denomination teaches salvation through Jesus Christ through faith (which the Bible, God’s word, spells out for us explicitly in Ephesians 2:8) the rest is not as significant. You might visit some congregations and see which makes you feel welcome. See which speaks to you. You might take some time and dig into the differences between some denominations – some are fascinating, and see what speaks to you. You can spend some time talking to God about it, but the real answer is all of them and none of them at the same time. They all have something to offer and none of them are exactly right as they are all based in some way on the ideas of people and we must strive to base our Christianity on the ideas of Jesus.