A Brief History Of Man

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."  --George Santayana

The Bible begins in eternity past and continues in real time and concludes in eternity future.  We are not in some episode between two oblivions but are here for a purpose--to glorify God, for all things were created for that purpose.  The story of man (i.e., His Story) is simply:  creation, fall, redemption, judgment.   We all fell in Adam and can be redeemed in Christ, and will all be judged by Christ (either the Bema of Christ or the Great White Throne of condemnation for the lost).  Where we end up for eternity depends upon our relation to Christ in this life with no second chances to redeem ourselves.  We Christians are just passing through as pilgrims to a heavenly city and our eternal reward, for our compensation is not in this life.  We believe that in the end the God of justice will make all things right and answer all our questions.

So we live in the hope of redemption from the slave market of sin and weakness of the flesh until we receive glorified bodies that don't have vulnerabilities, like Christ's.  We are here for a purpose: to complete the Great Commission and do God's will.  Happy are those who find their calling and purpose in life.  Someday this calling will be the Great Completion.  In the meantime, we are stewards of the time allotted us and must redeem it for the Lord's work.  We are here for a purpose--to please God and know Him personally, but not second hand. We long for Jesus to announce: "Well done, thou good and faithful servant!"

Jesus, who created time (the corollary of space and matter), and entered it for our sakes and lived life in the flesh in all its weaknesses except without sin, living the perfect law-abiding life to fulfill the Law of Moses and thus qualify as our righteousness. He became the perfect sacrifice by dying in our stead while being innocent of any transgression and the Father imputed our sin unto His account in the Divine Ledger.  And so Jesus made Himself known in real-time, for He existed prior to creation and is the Creator, but stepped into time so we would know God.  All we need to know of God is expressed in Jesus as His icon or image.

Jesus didn't become the Son of God by being born of the virgin Mary but is the eternal Son of God and that means there never was a time when He became the Son or wasn't the Son and the Father is the eternal Father and always was the Father of Jesus, not becoming the Father--He was begotten, not made, born, or adopted of God. God didn't create Him, give birth to Him nor adopt Him like He did us. And so, it was high time Jesus entered history in the fullness of time and complete our redemption that was planned by the Father.

In the meantime, we are on borrowed time as it were, and must be good stewards with time management.  The earth will end someday and we want to be on the right side that endures to the end.  Man is ever-learning in technology, but not in wisdom--the right usage of that knowledge: right ends, right motives, and in the right way.  Man will not evolve into perfection or have some mutation that puts us at a higher sphere of awareness wisdom, knowledge, and intelligence.  The problem isn't intelligence, but wisdom and only God grants that.  We need to know God, not the wisdom of man, for man cannot know nor find God through the wisdom of man.

As  Santayana said that if we don't remember the past, we will be condemned to repeat it!  And Hegel said, that one thing we learn from history is that we don't learn anything from history.  History is not cyclical in that it repeats itself (as Mark Twain said, "it only rhymes!"), but it's linear going in a direction and having a beginning, climax, and end, conclusion, consummation, and culmination.  It is going somewhere and has a purpose and story to tell from the Storyteller. History is merely God's redemptive plan and narrative for man unfolding in real-time as God orchestrates it.

History has meaning and we are to interpret it and study it to find out what God is saying.  NB:  The Bible is based in history too and is the only religion that is--dehistoricize it and you discredit the faith. We need to learn its lessons or be doomed to repeat its mistakes.  And the unfolding of history in the making is about God's ultimate purpose for mankind, it's not bunk but worth the study, while the key to understanding a story is to know the Storyteller--God!  We know the Author of the Bible as well and that's why we see Jesus at work in it.  Soli Deo Gloria!

Can Man Live Without God?...

"Men have forgotten God." (Alexander Solzhenitsyn)
"A person cannot live without worshiping something." (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

The whole concept of modern Secular Humanism is to exalt man (glory to man in the highest!) and to dethrone God and put Him in His place, as they see it. In other words, they proclaim: Up with man, down with God! Man has attempted to make a name for himself ever since the tower of Babel (cf. Gen. 11:4) and believes he can get along without God's intervention, grace, or providence. Man is deluded into thinking he can rule God out of the universe and doesn't need Him or He is irrelevant or unnecessary to explain reality.

Pertinent remarks by great thinkers: "Religion is indispensable to private morals and public order" (Cicero); "No society has ever been able to maintain a moral life without the aid of its religion" (William Durant). Humanism has been defined as "religion without God." And you don't have to be an atheist to have no place for God in your life, practical atheists believe in God, but live as though there is no God. Psalm 10:4 (HCSB) sums it up: "There is no accountability since God does not exist."

Humanist historian/philosopher (and author of The Story of Civilization) Will Durant posed the dilemma we face today as the postmodern philosophy (that "God is dead") that permeates society, and humanists try to be good without God in the equation: "The greatest question of our time is not communism vs. individualism, not Europe vs. America, nor even the East vs. the West; it is whether men can bear to live without God." People have no excuse not to believe in God (cf. Rom. 1:20), but they foolishly suppress the fact and are in a state of denial. They seem to think that God is no longer relevant, that we can solve our issues and problems without His input or intervention, and that we are basically good, not evil, or are perfectible. 

We live in an age when sinners decide that they are their own judges of morality and can make their own value judgments: "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes," much like Israel did, as recorded in Judges 21:25. Men find themselves judging God, rather than realizing He's their judge. Now the biggest problem nations face is that of keeping the peace, and there shall be wars and rumors of wars till the end, and when we reach peace we will no longer feel we need God. America is a so-called good nation by human standards as recorded by secular Alexis de Tocqueville, in his work Democracy in America, which he wrote after visiting the U.S, posited that our strength lies in our "goodness," and when we "ceased to be good we will cease to be great." This is not based on biblical nor historical precedent, but only personal deduction and observation.

Yes, America is different (we are probably the most religious nation on earth), yet we are failing on the world stage due to poor leadership and the good citizens (believers) cease to be salt and light and evil is winning by default, not because Christianity has failed, nor because its worldview is faulty, but because Christians fail to stand up and be counted, to take their stand for the right and to fly their Christian colors. It has been said by philosophers and historians that morality in a nation cannot be upheld without the aid of religion: George Bernard Shaw said that "no nation can survive the loss of its gods." George Washington said, "It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible." Christians ought to protest the secularization of a society that seeks to eradicate God from the public square and discourse. 

But we cannot silence God, though! If we try to go to war with Him we will lose and our nation will lose its blessing and providential hand. We fight this by speaking up against the evils of society, even if it entails becoming activists and doing whatever you can to mobilize the church and equip them for the battle. We are not to passively allow Satan to seize control!

When you take God out of the picture, there remains a vacuum that is filled with satanic activity. When we cease to worship God, we will ultimately find something else to worship, because man is meant and designed for worship!  No one actually worships, reveres, adores, or esteems nothing. God is the motive people have for good behavior because you see very few hospitals, orphanages, relief organizations, leprosariums founded by infidels. In India, they think that the suffering of man is caused by bad karma and you shouldn't interfere with another's karma!

We are at the point in our society where we don't know right from wrong and have lost our moral fiber because there's no moral compass and God condemns those who call good evil and evil good (cf. Isa. 5:20). There is an absolute standard to judge by and people do instinctively know right from wrong due to having a conscience and everyone is culpable to be blamed because of transcendent or natural law, which is above national law and even nations are subject to. You could say that the new battle is against God and the new war of independence is from God! People, in general, think that the Ten Commandments are obsolete or are the Ten Suggestions, and don't apply to a modern society and don't feel bound by them,  and they are free to make up their own rules as they go along to suit themselves. As long as they can think of some reason to justify themselves and have good motives, the reason that they are doing the right thing.

But goodness isn't defined by man, but by God and is in conformity with His nature. The basic diagnosis of man is that he does things his way and not God's way (as Isa. 53:6 says, "... we have turned everyone to his own way..."). We cannot know good without knowing God, for He is the final arbiter of it and will judge us and our standards of good versus His. Without God, Shakespeare summed up the essence of life as Macbeth mused in Hamlet: "... 'tis a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing." If we are not in God's image, we are mere animals and glorified apes: "Do you think we are mere animals? Do you think we are stupid?" (Job 18:3, NLT)--teach man he is an animal and he will act like one.

"Without God, life makes no sense," according to Rick Warren!"  If there is no God all things are permissible," according to Fyodor Dostoevsky, and there can be no absolutes or standards to measure perfection by. The world has nothing against religion as long as it remains privatized, but we are to spread the word and be obedient to the gospel without suppressing it--it's a command to obey not an option to consider. The implications of atheism are profound: No judge to make us feel guilty; no Lord ot guide us, no lawgiver to obey; no ruler or sovereign to submit to, no creator to emulate, know, and love; no hell to shun; and no heaven to look forward to--how dismal and bleak an outlook!

Romans 1:18ff shows what transpires once a man leaves God out of the reckoning. In the final analysis, God will bless America by association again when the church repents and gets back on track fulfilling the Great Commission (not the Great Suggestion), and not when it tries to implement sharia law or usher in the Millennial Kingdom, in order to "advance the cause of Christ" through legislation or government, though this may be the trend towards righteousness and a worthy cause. Soli Deo Gloria!

Learning A Christian Worldview

"No nation has survived the loss of its gods" (George Bernard Shaw).

A worldview is a way of interpreting your world, such as purpose in living, where you came from, and where you are going--our role in the world-system--questions such as: Is there right and wrong? Is there a God? What is the meaning of life? How do you interpret reality? There is a current war of ideas in the world: Marxism (basically an economic understanding, but also totalitarian, aiming to establish a domination of the proletariat or working class and abolishing the bourgeoisie in class warfare), Secular Humanism (basically that man is the measure of all things, up with man, down with God, or deifying man and dethroning God, and reality starts from man), New Age (the idea of cosmic consciousness or supra-consciousness, being in touch with the inner god), Postmodernism (founded by Nietzsche as the patron saint, saying that "God is dead" or irrelevant and we can live without Him), Islam (believing the future belongs to Islam and being bent on world hegemony), and Christianity (Christ's kingdom is in the hearts of man and not of this world and the church is a power to transform and preserve society) itself--the first five have one thing is common in that they oppose Christianity. Any viewpoint that doesn't start with God is evil!

We are to discern good and evil to be able to handle the meat of the Word (Heb. 5:14). Once we get saved, the battle has just begun and we enter Satan's turf as the god of this age. But the battle is the Lord's and as John said in 1 John 4:4, "Greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world." Paul says in Rom. 8:31, "If God be for us, who can be against us?" We have to know our enemy according to Sun Tzu in The Art of War because he believes in dividing and conquering, and playing mind games, and waging psychological warfare. "For we are not ignorant of his schemes" (cf. 2 Cor. 2:11). Don't give him a beachhead, but arm yourself with a divine viewpoint to understand what he is doing. Do not fight among yourselves as Lord Nelson noticed his troops doing when he said, "Gentlemen, remember, the enemy is over there!" In Walt Kelly's cartoon Pogo, he says, "We have met the enemy, and he is us." We can be our own worst enemy because the three enemies are the world-system itself, the devil and his minions, and our own flesh or sin nature (cf. 1 John 2:15 -16). The government is not the enemy, for all the powers that be are established of God (Rom. 13:1).

We are exhorted to "hate that which is evil and cling to that which is good" in Rom. 12:9 and in 1 Thess. 5:21-22 it says, "...hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil." [which means that when evil appears, resist it.] Only those who have their senses trained to "discern good and evil" can digest the meat of the word and the infants in Christ can only live on the milk of the Word according to Hebrews 5:14. We need to love God with our whole minds and not be indolent or anti-intellectual--we are to use the minds God has given us (Mark 12:30).

We are in the world, but not of it according to Scripture (John 15:19 says, "You are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world"). If we love the world-system or cosmos of Satan, the love of the Father is not in us--indeed he entices us with many delicacies of the world to compete with our spiritual appetites. Beware of the pseudo-philosophies of this age as the admonishment in Col. 2:8 says, "Let no man spoil you through philosophy or vain deceit..." We need to "contend for the faith" like Jude said in Jude 3 and that means taking stands for Jesus and sticking up for what is right in an evil world. We are the salt and light as the children of God.

Paul's swan song was: "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith" (2 Tim. 4:7). We all have a conscience and can tell right from wrong (Rom. 2:15), and we are all responsible and don't have any excuses for knowing God (Rom. 1:18-20). In 1 Chron. 12:32 it says that only a few people were able to interpret the times and knew what to do. Daniel 11:32 says that the "people who knew their God "shall be strong and do exploits." At the time of the end, the wise will understand and the wicked will not (Dan. 12:10). When Nebuchadnezzar realized that God was sovereign he came to his senses (Dan. 4:35).

Today we seem to be doing what's right in our own eyes (similar to the Israelites in Judges 21:25--"They did what was right in their own eyes"). The culture says that there is no standard of right and wrong--it is all relative and you can't force your morality on another person. It isn't that we can't legislate morality, it's whose morality we legislate.

In Allan Bloom's book, The Closing of the American Mind, he says that people now believe "all truth is relative"--if that is true then that statement has no value because it is also relative. They say nothing is always wrong and nothing is always right; what matters is sincerity. This goes back to Satan's lie: "Hath God said?" Gen. 3:1). They seem to believe that the only truths that are relative are those that defend the Christian worldview! One prof was reported as saying, "You can know nothing for certain." One astute student asked, "Are you sure?" "Yes, I am!" Jesus was the Truth itself, the incarnation of Truth with a capital T and came to bear witness of the truth--the Romans, including Pilate, doubted the existence of absolute truth (true no matter who believes it and whether anyone believes it). They thought that "might made right." This was the epitome of cynicism and an insult to Christ's veracity--he didn't even wait for an answer! The secret is to stay away from extremes: "Turn not to the right hand nor to the left: remove thy foot from evil" (cf. Prov. 4:27; Isa. 30:21; Josh. 23:6; 1 Kgs. 21:2)).

As Christians we are to "submit [ourselves] to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors..." (1 Pet. 2:12-13) Paul says something similar: "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God" (Rom. 13:1). We are to "render unto Caesar" according to Matthew 22:21 and even be light and salt in the world, trying to make people see the light to get saved according to our gift. With privilege there is the flip side of responsibility; they go hand in hand. There is such a thing as "social justice" not a social gospel, though. Our social commission has not been rescinded. One only need refer to the prophets, Amos and Micah. We assert that God is the only legitimate legislator (legal positivism says that man can make any law he desires) and His character is the law of the universe. Isaiah said, "Woe unto them who decree unjust laws..." (Isa. 10:1-2). It has been said, "If we have contempt for government, we get contemptible government."

God's providence works all things according to His divine decrees and He has no Plan B; He has no other plan, but to use us as His vessels of honor and to bring glory to him (cf. Isa. 43:7). Everything is going according to plan as Isaiah says in Isa 37:26 and He is in control according to Isa. 14:24, 27 and 46:8-11. "Behold, the nations are as a drop of the bucket..." (Isa. 40:15). "He's got the whole world in His hands." Psalm 22:28 says that God is sovereign over the nations and we can be sure even over every molecule in the universe. Eph. 1:11 says that God works out everything according to His will. John Wesley used to read the paper to "see what God is doing in His world." God is even in control of the toss of the die (Prov. 16:33) and in control of the whims of the king (Prov. 21:1). He leaves nothing to chance: Einstein said, "God doesn't play dice with the universe."

Christian worldview sees social injustice: "What do you mean by crushing My people and grinding the face of the poor...?" (Is. 3:15). "Rescue the weak and the needy..." (Ps. 82:4). The believer who knows the Lord is concerned about the plight of the poor (Ps. 41:1) and the evil in the world: he doesn't just see evil and say, "Why?" He also sees good and says, "Why not?" This is what it means to know the Lord according to Jeremiah 22:16--to be concerned about those less fortunate and defending those who can't defend themselves, the weak ("He pled the cause of the afflicted and needy; Then it was well. Is not that what it means to know Me?" declares the LORD [in Jer. 22:16]). Amos and Micah are champions of the underdog and the underprivileged and deplore how "they sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals--those who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth and turn aside the way of the afflicted (cf. Amos 2:6-7). "...Who oppress the poor, who crush the needy..." (Amos 4:1). Malachi is appalled at those "who oppress the hired worker in his wages..." (Mal. 3:5). We are not to be partial to the poor nor to the rich but show justice to all (Deut. 19:15). Charity and welfare were mandated in Israel according to Lev. 19:4, Deut. 15:4, and other passages--they were allowed to "glean the fields" of the landowners. There was to be "no poor in Israel."

Now, what kind of values are Christians supposed to espouse? They should subscribe to the sanctity of the family unit as having preference over the government's authority, because it was established before it; it should believe in the inherent worth of the individual (you have rights, but they end where mine begin--you can swing your fist but not hit my nose!) as being in the image and likeness of God (the imago Dei), and that means having a mind to know and communicate with God, a heart to love Him, and a will to obey Him. These are called unalienable rights and our culture is based on it in the constitutional Bill of Rights. We are merely stewards of God's riches ("The earth is the LORD's and the fullness thereof" says Ps. 24:10) and are responsible to Him to give an account at the judgment. (There is a Protestant work ethic mentioned in 2 Thess. 3:10 that declares that those who are not willing to work shall not eat.


All authority ultimately comes from God and we get our rights and dignity form Him; "unless you assume a God, the question of man's purpose is meaningless," and without God man is a "useless passion." (Bertrand Russell and Jean-Paul Sartre). We believe the government has limited power derived from God--it is not a necessary evil, as Augustine said, but necessary because of evil. We have a duty to this government since we owe them our security and protection of our property and our person from crime--justice and law and order are the primary functions. Marriage is to be held in honor and a "man shall leave his mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh" and "God made them male and female and said that it was good." No rights are absolute, such as you say it's your religion to be a cannibal or that you can yell fire in an auditorium! Sometimes it may be our duty to disobey, which is termed civil disobedience--God's laws trump the government; shall we obey God or man? ("We must obey God rather than man," according to Acts 5:29).

I believe firmly that the Bible sanctions no certain type of government, as long as human rights are respected. Government was first documented to be divided into three parts in Isa. 33:22 into the legislative, judicial, and executive branches (king, judge, lawgiver). I refer to Lord Acton's adage that is a cliche now: "Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely." We do not believe that our rights (note that the obverse of rights is responsibilities necessitated) are derived from the government, but directly from God, who gives us dignity and worth as man in His image or the ikons of God, as it were.

In the final analysis, it is vital to know Scripture to combat the prevalent secular humanistic viewpoint (deifying man and denying or dethroning God) in the world and not to fall into the devil's trap. Sir Francis Bacon said, "Knowledge is power." And the Bible backs this up in Proverbs 10:14 saying, "The wise lay up knowledge..." And Proverbs 24:5 says, "And a man of knowledge enhances his might." We must not remain silent and concede everything away. C. S. Lewis says, "They are trying to eradicate Christianity from the marketplace of ideas and the public square."

If God doesn't exist, everything is permissible (Dostoevsky). But we believe in transcendent or natural law that everyone is able to know by nature apart from the government. Law is designed for wrongdoers but God confers rights on us. People are in a state of rebellion against our so-called bourgeois values (which really is the Judeo-Christian heritage of Western civilization). As the psalmist says, "What can the righteous do when the foundations are destroyed?" (Ps. 11:3). For one thing, we should pray for our leaders, not condemn them [It is our God who put them there, as Paul said (cf. Acts 23:5), "It is unlawful to speak evil of a ruler of your people"]

Christians are not "utopians" but are waiting for Christ to usher in His Millennial Kingdom at His second coming. A word to the wise is sufficient: Christians have no geopolitical aspirations like the Muslim world bent on dominating the world with their hegemony, and they should not sound the alarm, but "occupy till He comes" (business as usual). As Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world." In conclusion, we have read the last page of the Bible and know how it all will turn out and are assured that we are on the winning side and victory is inevitable in the end. NB: Keep the faith! "The LORD frustrates the counsel of the nations; He thwarts the plans of the peoples...Happy is the nation whose God is Yahweh!" (Ps. 33:10-12). A word of encouragement--all is not lost: God is able to heal our land if we confess our corporate sins and humble ourselves in repentance as His people (2 Chron. 7:14). Soli Deo Gloria!

The Unfolding Of History...

"This is the plan determined for the whole world; this is the hand stretched out over all nations. For the LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?" (Isaiah 14:27, NIV).
"LORD, I know that people's lives are not their own; it is not for them to direct their steps" (Jer. 10:23, NIV).
"'...Surely, as I have planned, so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will happen'" (Isa. 14:24, NIV).
"The LORD foils the plans of the nations; he thwarts the purposes of the peoples" (Ps. 33:10, NIV).
"If men could learn from history, what lessons it might teach us. But passion and party blind our eyes...." --Samuel Taylor Coleridge

There are no accidents of history which is dependent upon impersonal, non-existent forces, such as fortune, fate, or luck! Don't sing, "Que sera, sera, what will be, will be!" Providence is God's answer to happenstance!

History is a story by a grand Storyteller, the great Orchestrator of History itself, God, which means it has a direction, meaning, and a conclusion or consummation; we ignore it at our peril!


The ancients believed in a cyclical historical narrative, whereby history repeated itself; however, Mark Twain said that history doesn't repeat itself, it only rhymes! The only thing we learn from history, it is said, is that we don't learn from history; that is probably why Henry Ford proclaimed history as "bunk." The Bible is the final arbiter of truth and what is "bunk," though. The communist ideology justifies itself and its dialectic materialism by positing history as the judge. Some religions, on the other hand, see karma as the inevitable judge of mankind, from which we cannot escape.


Do nations that unjustly go to war, to wage unjust wars reap what they sow, is there bad karma for them? It seems like the good guys don't always win and justice comes out the loser if one observes history, yet God orchestrates all history, and history is simply "His story." We have to acknowledge that we don't always see what God is up to in His world, as He micromanages it to the minutiae--there is indeed not one maverick molecule out of His control.


Karl Marx said something interesting about history: The point is not to interpret it, but to change it! I believe one of the biggest problems we have in our nation is its lack of familiarity with American and even world history. If we don't learn some basic lessons, we are doomed to repeat history. The Bible teaches a linear approach to interpret history, that it doesn't go in cycles but is heading toward a climactic event or consummation (the Second Coming of Christ). Scientists deny any supernatural intervention in history, such as the Deluge, and this is called the uniformitarian view of history--this is because they want to make the earth out to be billions of years old and this view supports their old-earth hypothesis.


History can be summed up according to biblical interpretation: Creation, fall, redemption, judgment! History and time had a beginning at creation and Secular Humanists can't adjust their worldview to include this approach, but hold to an eternal universe (such a theory is untenable in view of scientific evidence of a Big Bang). The point is that, if there was a beginning (Big Bang), there had to be a Beginner or one who pulled the trigger! Nothing just happens by itself! We must learn the lessons of history, and Christianity is the only faith and worldview that is based on history and has evidence to back it up.


In the final analysis, we don't know the future, but we know who holds the future! This doctrine is sometimes referred to as Providence and we must learn to not second-guess God. Certainly, as Ben Franklin observed: "I have lived a long time, and the longer I live, the more I realize that God governs in the affairs of men." God has no back-up plan nor a Plan B, and His will cannot be frustrated by us, as we cannot thwart Him (cf. Job 42:2). 

History is something we really don't understand and cannot fathom, until after the fact, when we can see more objectively what God is doing in the affairs of men; therefore to conjecture about the future or to make prognostications is out of our realm of competency, since we don't have a crystal ball that works--it's God's dominion--we trust God for the future, and must realize that our future or (times) is in His hands (cf. Psalm 31:15).


In sum, consider the following verses (Psalm 22:28 (NIV); Job 36:23 (HCSB); and Daniel 4:35, NIV): "[F]or dominion belongs to the LORD and he rules over the nations," "Who has appointed His way for Him, and who has declared, 'You have done wrong'?" "...No one can hold back his hand or say to him: 'What have you done?'" Soli Deo Gloria!

What Good Is History?...

"Of the sons of Issachar, men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do, their chiefs were two hundred..." (1 Chron. 12:32, NASB).
"What experience and history teach is this--that people and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it." (Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Philosophy of History).

We must realize that history is God's redemption story told in real time and God involves itself in history that is called interventionism and he is in control of history as he orchestrates it to the very detail determining the boundaries of the nations in the rise and fall kings. History goes in a direction that is not circular but linear it is headed towards a culmination and a climax when Christ comes and it can be interpreted we must learn from history.  The Bible says history can repeat itself. 

It does in a sense rhyme it comes back in different ways to learn and teach us new lessons and we don't learn them. Like what happens in Germany could happen here we must realize that we are not above being judged by God.  We must hope that history has a turning point and we can change directions we can still redeem ourselves and reclaim ourselves for God's sake in the world and be a light to the world as we once were as America. We can find meaning and history and learn our lessons even to apply to a person alive not just a story and it's not meant to entertain or be entertaining but to teach us wisdom and make us realize that God is in control of history it is his story.

Henry Ford said, "I don't know much about history, and I wouldn't give a nickel for all the history in the world." Businessmen have little use for academic subjects since their line of work is largely practical and commonsensical. It matters little whether Ford knew about the Civil War, except that he mistakenly named one of his cars the Lincoln! (I'll say tongue in cheek!) It has been said (by Georg W. F. Hegel, et al.) that the one thing we learn from history is that we don't learn from it! Christianity is a religion of historical significance and is based on history and is dependent upon it as God's redemptive narrative that is headed in a direction at the culmination of Christ's Second Coming and Judgment Day to end all history.

Some erroneous views of history include uniformitarianism (God doesn't intervene miraculously, such as in the Deluge) and cyclical conceptions or views, whereby it's repeated in cycles---we hold it's going in a direction towards a consummation or is linear in conception. History is not the judge, as Communists believe, but a lesson to be studied and learned. We're not doomed to repeat our mistakes! We dare not discard our common heritage and legacy! Why? Our men in uniform have given the ultimate sacrifice to secure a place in the world's stage of nations. Marx thought the point of history was to change it, not just study it! 

However, the world is not as simple as a business transaction or the bottom line--diplomacy is a skill to be sought out and valued. We have a heritage of relationships in our nation with other nations that have taken decades, and many administrations to mold. To throw away and start from scratch every administration would be ill-advised, as well as disastrous. To be specific, we have made treaties and trade pacts that need to be honored, to keep the good faith and integrity of our nation intact. The president really has no right to start from scratch and issue all new treaties unilaterally, just because he disagrees with them. The honorable thing for one president to do is to honor the commitments made by his predecessors. We are finding out too late that George Washington may have been right to warn us of foreign entanglements and treaties, and even of political parties, that tend to divide.

The point of continuity in our foreign policy is to keep credibility and our friends from becoming our competitors and potential enemies or even adversaries by virtue of their alliances. What they say is that a friend of our enemy is our enemy! Don't even flirt with danger! Don't create the vacuum to make this possible! This is no time to be sucking up to our adversaries and trying to mold breakthrough relationships and alliances that are revolutionary and even upset the world order. It is vital that we recognize the world order and the balance of power in the world and not upset the apple cart. America doesn't have to remain the world's police, but we are without a doubt the leader of the free world and this comes with the territory. When America speaks the world listens!

What we have is a failure to learn from history: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it," according to George Santayana. The U.S. is not a business venture run by corporate CEOs and is not immune to the lessons of history. Instead of making friends of our enemies, we seem to be making enemies of our allies in one sense of the word. 

Be that as it may, I am mainly concerned that we don't dissolve treaties, and end up going to war because of a lack of foresight or wisdom through good counsel. Do we have to end up in war before we learn our lesson that diplomats and statesmen know something and that it's not all about the bottom line or the pulse of the people, as a populist president seems to think? Soli Deo Gloria!

Can Man Live Without God?...

"Men have forgotten God." (Alexander Solzhenitsyn)
"A person cannot live without worshiping something." (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

The whole concept of modern Secular Humanism is to exalt man (glory to man in the highest!) and to dethrone God and put Him in His place, as they see it. In other words, they proclaim: Up with man, down with God! Man has attempted to make a name for himself ever since the tower of Babel (cf. Gen. 11:4) and believes he can get along without God's intervention, grace, or providence. Man is deluded into thinking he can rule God out of the universe and doesn't need Him. 

 Pertinent remarks by great thinkers: "Religion is indispensable to private and morals and public order" (Cicero); "No society has ever been able to maintain a moral life without the aid of its religion" (William Durant). Humanism has been defined as "religion without God." And you don't have to be an atheist to have no place for God in your life, practical atheists believe in God, but live as though there is no God. Psalm 10:4 (HCSB) sums it up: "There is no accountability since God does not exist."

Humanist historian/philosopher (and author of The Story of Civilization) Will Durant posed the dilemma we face today as the postmodern philosophy (that "God is dead") that permeates society; and humanists try to be good without God in the equation: "The greatest question of our time is not communism vs. individualism, not Europe vs. America, nor even the East vs. the West; it is whether men can bear to live without God." People have no excuse not to believe in God (cf. Rom. 1:20), but they foolishly suppress the fact and are in a state of denial. They seem to think that God is no longer relevant, that we can solve our issues and problems without His input or intervention, and that we are basically good, not evil.

We live in an age when sinners decide that they are their own judges of morality and can make their own value judgments: "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes," much like Israel did, as recorded in Judges 21:25. Men find themselves judging God, rather than realizing He's their judge. Now the biggest problem nations face is that of keeping the peace, and there shall be wars and rumors of wars till the end, and when we reach peace we will no longer feel we need God. 

America is a so-called good nation by human standards as recorded by secular Alexis de Tocqueville, in his work Democracy in America, which he wrote after visiting the U.S, posited that our strength lie in our "goodness," and when we "ceased to be good we will cease to be great." This is not based on biblical nor historical precedent, but only personal deduction and observation.

Yes, America is different (we are probably the most religious nation on earth), yet we are failing on the world stage due to poor leadership and the good citizens (believers) cease to be salt and light and evil is winning by default, not because Christianity has failed, nor because its worldview is faulty, but because Christians fail to stand up and be counted, to take their stand for the right and to fly their Christian colors. It has been said by philosophers and historians that morality in a nation cannot be upheld without the aid of religion: George Bernard Shaw said that "no nation can survive the loss of its gods." George Washington said, "It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible."

Christians ought to protest the secularization of a society that seeks to eradicate God from the public square and discourse. We cannot silence God, though! If we try to go to war with Him we will lose and our nation will lose its blessing and providential hand. We fight this by speaking up against the evils of society, even if it entails becoming activists and doing whatever you can to mobilize the church and equip them for the battle. We are not to passively allow Satan to seize control!

When you take God out of the picture, there remains a vacuum that is filled with satanic activity. When we cease to worship God, we will ultimately find something else to worship, because man is meant and designed for worship! God is the motive people have for good behavior because you see very few hospitals, orphanages, relief organizations, leprosariums founded by infidels. In India, they think that the suffering of man is caused by bad karma and you shouldn't interfere with another's karma!

We are at the point in our society where we don't know right from wrong and have lost our moral fiber because there's no moral compass and God condemns those who call good evil and evil good (cf. Isa. 5:20). There is an absolute standard to judge by and people do instinctively know right from wrong due to having a conscience and everyone is culpable to be blamed because of transcendent or natural law, which is above national law and even nations are subject to.

You could say that the new battle is against God and the new war of independence is from God! People, in general, think that the Ten Commandments are obsolete and don't apply to a modern society and don't feel bound by them, free to make up their own rules as they go along to suit themselves. As long as they can think of some reason to justify themselves and have good motives, the reason that they are doing the right thing.

But goodness isn't defined by man, but by God and is in conformity with His nature. The basic diagnosis of man is that he does things his way and not God's way (as Isa. 53:6 says, "... we have turned every one to his own way..."). We cannot know good without knowing God, for He is the final arbiter of it and will judge us and our standards of good versus His. 

 Without God, Shakespeare summed up the essence of life as Macbeth mused: "... 'tis a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing." If we are not in God's image, we are mere animals and glorified apes: "Do you think we are mere animals? Do you think we are stupid?" (Job 18:3, NLT)--teach man he is an animal and he will act like one.

"Without God, life makes no sense," according to Rick Warren! "If there is no God all things are permissible," according to Fyodor Dostoevsky, and there can be no absolutes or standards to measure perfection by. The world has nothing against religion as long as it remains privatized, but we are to spread the word and be obedient to the gospel without suppressing it--it's a command to obey not an option to consider. The implications of atheism are profound: No judge to make us feel guilty; no lawgiver to obey; no ruler or sovereign to submit to, no creator to emulate, know, and love; no hell to shun; and no heaven to look forward to--how dismal and bleak an outlook!

Romans 1:18ff shows what transpires once man leaves God out of the reckoning. In the final analysis, God will bless America by association again when the church repents and gets back on track fulfilling the Great Commission (not the Great Suggestion), and not when the church tries to implement Sharia law or usher in the Millennial Kingdom, to "advance the cause of Christ" through legislation or government. Soli Deo Gloria!

Can Man Live Without God In The Picture?

I'm not saying what would happen if there were no God (Acts 17:28 says, "For in Him we live and move and have our being..."), but how man's worldview is affected without a foundation in God--we must begin with God and explain the universe, not begin with the universe and explain God away!  Athanasius said that the only system of though that Christ will fit into is the one where He is the starting point. 



Man cannot survive without conceiving of God; His manifest reality is known to every tribe, nation, and tongue or civilization.  Man isn't naturally an atheist or agnostic, but religious to the core; he has been dubbed Homo religiosus or the religious being.  They also call him Homo divinus, or the divine being (in the image of God or imago Dei).  Man is meant or hard-wired for worship, and if he doesn't find God, he will worship someone or something else, which is idolatry.  There is a gap or vacuum that must be filled and only God can adequately do the job.  Pascal did say that only God can fill this empty space and Augustine said that we are restless till we find our peace or rest in God.



When you take God out of the reckoning, man becomes uncivilized, as witnessed and documented in Romans 1, where God gives man up to his perversions.  Yes, we need God, He doesn't need us!  We can only find our fulfillment in Him and serving Him.  There is indeed purpose in life when one knows the Lord and serves Him; the chief end of man, according to The Westminster Shorter Catechism, is "to glorify God and enjoy Him forever"--taken from Isaiah 43:7, which says we're created for His glory.  We are the icons of God, bearing His image to the world and God has something to say through us; we are His voice to spread the Word, not angels! 



Without God, man has come from nothing, has no meaning in life, and is heading nowhere!   We must be able to answer the ultimate questions of life to have meaning and fulfillment:  Where did I come from?  Why am I here?  Where am I headed or going to?  What is man's destiny?  Is there a difference between right and wrong?  The Bible answers all these questions and science cannot because they are out of its domain or turf.  Science cannot make philosophical, religious, ethical, nor metaphysical judgments--neither can it make any value judgments, it is the "know-how," not the "know-why."  Yes, science is limited and we must not put our ultimate faith in it to solve all our problems or answer all our questions.



The scientific method doesn't apply to the metaphysical answers to the physical and to the spiritual, religious, ethical, nor moral domains.  For example, you cannot measure three feet of love, nor five pounds of justice, yet they exist and are real.  Love exists, yet you cannot prove or disprove it either!  In science, you have to have laboratory conditions, be able to measure, observe, and repeat an experiment with variables and controls to get a working hypothesis and finally a theory, and then a scientific, verifiable fact.   



Note that it's only because of the Christian worldview that science was made possible and the first scientists were Christians--there's no final conflict between science and the Bible, which is not a science text, but has no scientific absurdities or erroneous ideas.  Where it does make scientific claims, the info is correct and has been proven ahead of its time--such as the discovery of the water cycle, and ocean currents, the fact that the earth is round and is hung on nothing in space!   When science alienates Christians and becomes their enemy, they become unscientific and dogmatic, which is not scientific. 



When we try to establish ethics without God, it is impossible to have a foundation.  Fyodor Dostoevsky said that without God all things are permissible or up for grabs.  God is the source of absolute truth with a capital T and if there is no God, there can be no absolute Truth!  And so, without God, man is like a ship without a rudder with no anchor nor moral compass!  We are a law unto ourselves and each of us can make up our own ethical system as we go along, and morality is simply what we decide it is as a group, and it changes over time as we get more "civilized."   The Ten Commandments are then obsolete and too binding for our free lifestyle, which has no restraints nor limits.  



"Law is merely the majority vote that licks all others," to quote Oliver Wendell Holmes.  The Bible says in Psalm 11:3 that "when the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?"  We have then lost our moral fiber as a nation and become free spirits, each man doing his own thing and what is right in his own eyes, the way Israel did before it had a king (cf. Judges 21:25).  God cares a lot about right and wrong and we have His moral law in our hearts in the form of conscience (cf. Rom. 2:15)--unfortunately, some choose to ignore it do evil.  We were meant for something better than anarchy and immoral, unethical society.



The end result is that man worships himself, fame, fortune, power, popularity, success, possessions, and even does hero worship, all of which are unfulfilling false gods and idolatry, that cannot meet man's inner longing for a relationship with God, not merely acknowledging or knowing He exists.  Jesus promised abundant life to all sincere seekers and God will authenticate Himself to everyone who diligently searches for Him (cf. Heb. 11:6)--He's not playing cosmic hide-and-seek, but will not reveal Himself to triflers!



An so the biggest question and issue facing man today is whether he can live without God, according to humanist historian/philosopher Will Durant, and our government becomes the highest law, in the land and is accountable to no one as final Judge.  Consequently, there is no Judgment Day, no Lawgiver, and no Ruler of man, no hell to shun, and no motive to be good, all because man doesn't put God in the equation.



Just like Friedrich Nietzsche declared God dead, or irrelevant and unnecessary, we must find out for ourselves the hard way, because man refuses to listen to the modern-day prophets and heed what Scripture says; man is ultimately headed nowhere and history has no meaning or purpose, with no climax, conclusion, or consummation either.  Man becomes a glorified ape or hominid, without the dignity of being in God's image, having any restraint on evil, and being able to communicate and know Him. 

 Soli Deo Gloria!

Giving Too Much Credit To Providence

"I have lived a long time and the longer I live the more I see that God governs in the affairs of men." (Benjamin Franklin).  

We should attribute everything that happens in the world to Providence; however, this is to say that God is always completely sovereign.  He rules the nations, which are but a drop in the bucket and is in control over every last atom in the cosmos--there are no rebellious, maverick molecules!  God is in control of all things small and great and His sovereignty isn't limited by our freedom!  But technically speaking, Providence refers not only to the guidance of the believer's life but the governing, concurrence, and sustaining of creation, election refers to his sovereign salvation and predestination refers to the way God manipulates his salvation to bring him to faith and repentance.

The unbeliever cannot claim God's blessings is guiding him to victory.  God does indeed step into history and intervene; He's not just a spectator or onlooker either!  He is actively involved and nothing is too small to overlook or too great to overpower Him.  To be sovereign you have to be almighty and omniscient.  It would be pathetic if God were all-wise and had not the power to bring about His purposes, and it would be horrific if He were all-powerful and not wise enough to implement it according to a good end.  But we can be assured that God is good and will accomplish His purposes in the end.  It's just like Aslan the lion, in The Chronicles of Narnia (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S.Lewis), (a type of Christ) who said, "'Course, [He] isn't safe," said, Mr. Beaver.  "But [H]e's good...."

The danger we face today is some religious zealots are about to claim that our president was elected by a special act of blessing or Providence!  Would they go so far as to say that Clinton was also elected by Providence, even Obama?  As a matter of fact, God does raise men up: to punish as well as to bless!  But no, they want to single out one president and make him the object of special anointing to save our nation as God's man for president, not king.

I do believe God put President Trump in office for a purpose and according to God's wisdom, but that doesn't mean he's a messiah figure or on a special mission from God! In his case, we should concur that the jury is still out and history will judge: we cannot know whether he's on the right side of it or not!  People who make claims like this don't see the big picture and don't realize that a complete reversal could happen next election and that history may judge our president in a different light that we don't see now.

In the final analysis, Providence is God's answer to happenstance and we must realize that everything from the tossing of the die to the king's heart is in God's control and we must deny the possibility of blind fate, dumb luck, and blind fortune!  There are no impersonal forces at play!  Yes, we can say with faith that we will let the chips fall where they may and that God is in control!   Nothing can happen without God's permission and we have peace when the chips are down and through thick and thin!  What we see taking place is that God clearly orchestrates all history and it will be culminated in a conclusion according to His design, plan, and intentions.    NB:  Wycliffe's tenet is a word to the wise:  "All things come to pass by necessity."    Soli Deo Gloria!

The Never-ending Story

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." --George Santayana
"The Christian belief system ... is relevant to all of life." --Carl F. H. Henry
A WORLDVIEW OF HISTORY FROM A CHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVE

History is a grand narrative or "Big Story" written by the Great Storyteller--God! It has a purpose, meaning (hence an Ultimate Mind), and significance; it's going in a direction (hence a Director) that will be consummated at the Second Coming of Christ. It seems to repeat itself or be cyclical (but it's linear) because we often don't learn the lessons of history and are condemned to repeat it because of our ignorance. History is not bunk, but worthy of study and totally relevant to our day. We ought to be careful not to interpret persons involved in history as if they lived in the modern era; for instance, Lincoln may have seemed like a racist in today's political correctness.

The important lesson to learn is that no one can claim history is over and they have achieved victory until Christ returns! Any such claim is premature and presumptuous gloating and assumes that God doesn't also punish and have reasons for allowing events to transpire which we cannot comprehend. "Philosophers have only interpreted the world differently; the point is, however, to change it." --Karl Marx

All of history can be seen in the light of good and evil and these forces in timeless, linear conflict from the day Adam took of the proverbial apple and decided on his own plan, desires, wisdom, rules, standards, approval, discernment, and way. The Way of Christ is not one of many ways to understand history, nor the best way, but the only way! The only system of thought Christ will fit into is the one where He is the starting point, according to Athanasius. 

Where you begin determines where you'll end up! As Carl Henry said, we must live in light of eternity and realize Christianity is relevant to all of life's academic disciplines and making sense of reality; for Plato said that in order to know how to live in reality, one must know what God is really like! Some may object that it's illogical to begin with an unproven premise and claim a certain conclusion; however, atheists begin with an unproven universal negative and don't reckon that all knowledge is contingent and begins in faith.

When doomsayers say we are headed toward Armageddon we must be skeptical and not set dates, but realize that His Parousia is always imminent ("... this is the last hour..," cf. 1 John 2: 18, NIV) and we must always be ready to meet our Lord regardless. We must learn "to interpret the times" per 1 Chron. 12:32 and fly our Christian colors, even daring to be Daniels in this day and age of Secular Humanism that wants to dethrone God and deify or exalt man, making a name for themselves at God's expense. We cannot solve our problems by ourselves but need God's intervention. History will march on with or without us and God's purposes will prevail with or without our contribution or cooperation. No political party can claim final victory as if history doesn't march on and times they are a-changing.

What we can do in our setbacks is to take inventory and do a spiritual checkup and evaluate our stands to see if they align with God's will and worldview--for we all must be willing to admit that we could be wrong or we'll never arrive at the truth, willing to go where the evidence leads. We must not close our minds and refuse to see other viewpoints when we don't understand. But God can give discernment to determine good from evil. Christianity is a historical faith or it's nothing!

You might say that it's not over till it's over or until the fat lady sings! We must not be presumptuous that the tide won't turn the other way just as they say that what goes around comes around--God balances things out in the end and works it all for His glory (cf. Eph. 1:11). That's why it's important to be gracious, not vindictive in treating others. When Lincoln was asked how he'd deal with the South after the Civil War, he said he'd handle them as if they never left the Union! ("With malice toward none, with charity toward all....") We must never get discouraged as if we don't believe God is in control of history and actually micromanages every event--He orchestrates all of history to go in His favor.

God is not like the God of Aristotle "who reigns but doesn't rule" (like the sovereign of the UK) but He actually is in full control and sovereign without any maverick molecules in the entire cosmos--God leaves nothing to chance (cf. Prov. 16:33) and there are no flukes in nature or history. God's sovereignty isn't limited by our freedom! The God Einstein conceived was more accurate: "God doesn't play dice with the universe"

The Christian conception of history depends upon the objective veracity of Scripture and the reliability of its subjective experience in believers. History, or time, had a beginning (hence an Author and Creator), is going in a direction (hence a Director), and will reach a conclusion or ending point at the climax of Judgment Day. In four words history is described as creation, fall, redemption, judgment!

When Christ died on the cross and rose again, this was the most important event in all of history and it's the turning point, and it's evidenced by many infallible proofs (cf. Acts 1:3). By definition, "history is the unfolding of God's ultimate, redemptive plan for mankind in real time" as God entered it in the person of Jesus Christ saving man from himself, sin, death, Satan, and God's wrath.

In the meantime, we need not get nearsighted and miss the forest for the trees but realize God is at work in mysterious ways that we know not! The plot goes on! The plot thickens! But we must never jump ship or bail out and give up on God who will work it out at the end of time, and we will be glad we're on the right side of history! Meanwhile, we may need to remove ourselves from the events and not get so personally involved, to see things in proper perspective. Our worldview determines what kind of handle we get on current events. "God does not play dice with the universe." --A. Einstein

One may view history erroneously because he's too involved and time will tell as God makes course corrections--it's like the swing of a pendulum with man overreacting and not being informed to act rationally; being rash always brings error (we must be removed and objective enough to rightly interpret--hindsight!). History by its very nature is nonrepeatable and therefore not subject to empirical investigation or analysis (in the domain of scientific inquiry)--one's religion and philosophy enter into the equation. In short, history is meaningful (hence a Mind).

CAVEAT: DON'T GET TUNNEL VISION AND FOCUS ON THE HERE AND NOW! "Everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him" (Col. 1:16B, MSG); "... who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will" (Eph. 1:11, NIV). NB: Christ's coming changed the course of history!

Christianity is a historical religion OR IT IS NOTHING! It's historicized and never proven otherwise by archaeologists and if dehistoricized, it's fully discredited. But the Bible "has more marks of authenticity than any profane history." --Sir Isaac Newton We can be thankful our God is the God of history and has the whole world's story in His hands. One could easily posit the Bible as the best book on history ever penned by man. And never lose track of the fact that God works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform. Finally, history looks forward to the consummation of the Second Coming and we don't have to know the future's details, but we know who holds the future! 

In sum, the plot thickens and history marches on by God's intervention:  creation, fall, redemption, judgment, heaven or hell.               Soli Deo Gloria!

Is History Just Bunk?...

"It may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever controverted a biblical reference."--Nelson Glueck, archaeologist
"What experience and history teach is this--that people and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it."--Georg W. F.  Hegel
"I don't know much about history, and I wouldn't give a nickel for all the history in the world."---Henry Ford 
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."--George Santayana   "A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts."--Paul Johnson, historian  
"It is not now the man of faith, it is the skeptic, who has reason to fear the course of discovery."--Ibid. 

Henry Ford had no respect for the academic discipline of history and called it bunk!  History is not circular or cyclical, but we must learn the lessons again, or relearn from our mistakes the hard way.  You cannot relegate the study of history to consisting of the narrative of man's inhumanity to man, nor of the survival of the fittest; there is a divine input and factor to be reckoned with. Biblical history is linear: it has a starting point, a direction, a climax, a culmination or consummation, and a climactic ending point or conclusion.

In Stephen Hawking's book,  A Brief History of Time, he referred to time beginning at the Big Bang as it has become popularized, [posited as the corollary of space and matter] (cf. 2 Tim. 1:9; Titus 1:2; Gen. 1:1).  There was a beginning to everything that exists in time and space, except God Himself, who had no beginning and is, therefore, eternal and unbound or defined by the time/space continuum in which He created and we are imprisoned and confined so to speak.  History is important because Christianity is the only faith grounded in history and fact, and its historicity has been vouched for by over 25,000 archaeological digs and over 5000 manuscripts proving the veracity and fidelity of scriptural transmission to give us an accurate text, with much corroboration. It is deplorable that when a secular historian is a contrarian to a biblical scholar, the former is assumed the unbiased one.

Modern man tends to interpret history in the so-called uniformitarian way or denying any supernatural intervention such as the Deluge or Noah's flood.  Christianity is history and history is God's story in a manner of speaking--it has a storyteller.  If you could "dehistoricize" the Bible, it would be completely discredited, even if one legitimate, proven error was found in its portrayals of events, persons, or places.  But even secular historians will not deny that the coming of Christ changed the course of history and that He is the dominant figure in Western civilization.  I wonder if the disciples had any presentiment of the place they'd occupy in world history and of the history of the Church, as narrated so accurately and faithfully by Luke in Acts.

I heard that the present administration has no regard for history and is relatively ignorant of it; the error is that they fail to see any meaning in history or its inherent worth as an academic discipline.  We should not resort to the cynicism of Karl Marx, who said that the point is not to interpret history, but to change it!  Change isn't always good, and change for change sake is evil and one must be willing and ready to go forward, not backward and relive our errors and mistakes of the past.  What is the scope and view of history from God's eye?  It is nothing but creation, fall, redemption, judgment, and finally eternity in heaven or hell.  The Bible picks up the story as going from generation to degeneration to regeneration!

Yes, history is headed toward a climactic conclusion and resolution and it's up to us to interpret the times and act accordingly and appropriately, knowing what to do!  It used to be that secular historians and scholars would even doubt the historicity of Jesus Christ, but none would risk his reputation by alleging that stance today, because the evidence is overwhelming and the corroborating evidence so convincing and even conclusive, that secularists must realize that Christ and the Christian faith must be reckoned with and explained or accepted, because they cannot be dismissed as legend or myth--the great question of history that must be answered by all is this:  "Who is Jesus?"  He is the center point and focuses of history, the Bible being all about Him, and He will bring it to a head, and everyone's judgment of Him will be the criterion for his eternal destiny.  The Christian experience is real because it's based on verifiable, historical fact and can be tested by subjective, personal experience--as they say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating or "Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good" (cf. Psalm 34:8, ESV).

The great comfort of the faith is that we can be assured that God is in absolute, complete control and we can know that there will be a future for all believers with Him.  Josh McDowell sums it up quite well in that the resurrection is the central fact of the faith, and it's based in history as objective fact, and it is either the most wonderful event in history or it's the cruelest hoax ever perpetrated on mankind.  According to D. James Kennedy, the resurrection is arguably the best-attested fact of antiquity.  If one looks at the evidence with an open mind with no preconceived notions or bias, there are "many infallible proofs," as Luke wrote in Acts 1:3.  The downside is that there is never enough evidence for the skeptic, but ample evidence for the sincere seeker of truth. God and truth are inseparable, and that is why the Bible's veracity and fidelity are so paramount to the faith--one cannot disbelieve due to lack of evidence!

It's important to interpret history in light of Scripture, because secularism sees us as progressing towards perfection and utopia, while we are really headed toward world-wide confrontation and war, culminating in one-world government by the Antichrist before Christ ushers in his reign during the Millennial Kingdom, coming after a Great Tribulation and judgment of God on the nations.  What is history then?  It's the ultimate unfolding, progressing of God's redemptive, judgmental plan for all mankind in real time.  It makes a difference what one makes of history--it's HIS STORY!

Caveat:  Secular worldviews jeopardize our future with such interpretations as seeing us heading toward and evolving into utopia and globalism; or that tomorrow belongs to Islam; or that history is the judge; or that it's a dialectic of class warfare; and even that there is no purpose or meaning to it and it's not worthy of our serious study.  We must persevere with faith in Providence, that our Forefathers adhered to and believed God is ultimately in control and good will triumph over evil in God's timetable.

In sum, the whole Christian concept and worldview of history are dependent on the veracity, reliability, credibility, fidelity, and accuracy of the Bible, which is a historical document from cover to cover. All in all, such concepts as God punishing our nation or smiling upon us with blessings, are foreign to the secular outlook on history, which removes God from the equation and reckoning, trying to declare God dead or irrelevant to history.   We can be thankful that the God of faith is the God of history, who orchestrates it, and doubting its historicity is mere hyper-criticism--it's never been proven erroneous, so why not trust it?

NOTE:  IT'S A SAD COMMENTARY ON OUR TIMES THAT SO MUCH EVIDENCE IS AVAILABLE AND THE BIBLE HAS ALWAYS PROVEN TRUE TO ITS FACTS AND HISTORICAL ACCOUNTS, YET WHEN THERE IS A DISCREPANCY WITH A SECULAR HISTORIAN, THE BIBLE IS THE ONE THAT IS QUESTIONED AND HELD UP TO SCRUTINY.  WHY IS THAT WHILE THE BIBLE HAS PROVEN SO RELIABLE IN ITS FACTS AND HISTORY, THAT SOME DOUBT ITS SPIRITUAL AND MORAL VALUES?  Soli Deo Gloria!

The Gibraltar Of Christianity

"To them he presented himself alive after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God"  (Acts 1:3, ESV).
"Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers a one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep"  (1 Cor. 15:6, ESV).  

This is an apologetic for the resurrection of Christ and is included with worldview posts because acceptance or rejection affects one's interpretation of history, and whether he believes God intervenes in it or plays an active part (as Deists deny).  A so-called uniformitarian view holds that God if there is one, doesn't intervene in human affairs, nor cause any cataclysmic events.   As Ben Franklin said, "I have lived a long time and the longer I live the more convincing proofs I see that God governs in the affairs of men."  Believing in a supernatural God, and that with God nothing is impossible, settles the issue, for this is merely child's play for the almighty Creator of the universe and the one who holds all things together in His hands.

One's approach to interpreting history is affected because his philosophy biases him for or against the supernatural and how we can "know" historical events and verify them to our satisfaction.  It is not the denial of the miracle of the resurrection that is at stake, but the whole concept of their existence and possibility.  Denying the fact of miracles leads to the ultimate conclusion that there is no God, which cannot be proved (logicians know you cannot prove a universal negative!).

The crux of the Christian faith is its dependence on the resurrection of Christ to be the foundation and inception.  You must accept this fact or the whole faith is disemboweled.  The resurrection is the final proof that Christ's sacrifice was accepted, that there is a heaven to hope for and that Christ is the one and only Son of God.  This is the most crucial and vital fact of history--the most astonishing and fantastic fact--or it is the biggest and cruelest hoax ever perpetrated on mankind.  There is no middle ground; it is not a legend since there was not the time for it to develop till the gospels were written (probably before AD 70).  The historicity of Christ is beyond dispute by any reputable modern historian because it is vouched for by many secular forces as well as the internal testimony of the Word.

How do we know this as historical fact, though?  History, by its very nature, cannot be proved in a scientific manner (it's out of the realm of science because it's nonrepeatable).  How do we know that Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth?  There are no witnesses alive today to verify it, but we do have documentation that is credible, and trustworthy.  We must assess the veracity of the records and the dependability of the eye-witnesses--consummate, inveterate liars, and lunatics or madmen are not reliable witnesses, no matter the number.

However, in the case of Scripture, we have four noblemen who lived in the times of skepticism and persecution for their faith, and they have the character that one could believe. We can believe the records written because they give no evidence of rantings and ravings of madmen.  Simon Greenleaf, a prof at Harvard, and one of the world's foremost authorities on legal evidence became a believer in Christ by examining the evidence and announced that, if an unbiased jury were to hear it, they would proclaim the resurrection as historical fact.  There certainly isn't a lack of evidence to support it, one must have preconceived ideas or prejudices to deny it.  The heart of the matter is that it's a matter of the heart, and people feign intellectual problems as smokescreens to hide their moral rebellion and unwillingness to do God's will.

There is no way you can disprove it:  The opposite of the resurrection is not that people don't rise from the dead, but that God cannot raise the dead, specifically, that He cannot rise from the dead Himself.  All science can say is that people don't normally rise from the dead, all things being equal. There is no law that says so, it has just been observed that men normally die and conclusions were drawn.  Jesus predicted His resurrection and there is plenty of circumstantial evidence to verify it: The appearances of Christ to doubting apostles, who had to be convinced against their better judgment (Thomas said he wouldn't believe unless he could put his hand in Christ's side) and they had become disillusioned, reverting to their former way of life, such as fishing; the many eyewitnesses that were alive when the gospels were written that could've dispelled the belief--it would be like someone saying that FDR claimed to be the Son of God today; one famous lawyer (Frank Morrison, asked that pivotal question and wrote Who Moved the Stone? --it was guarded and heavy; one must account for the empty tomb and everyone knew where it was and could've checked it out; how do you explain the rise of the church that taught the resurrection, the martyrdom of thousands for the faith, when all they had to do to save their hide was deny this fact; the day of worship was changed from the Sabbath day to the Lord's day (and Jews practically had a fetish about this command); the grave clothes were undisturbed and this made an instant believer out of John, showing supernatural exit; and most convincing is the dramatic change in the lives of the apostles, going from timid and frightened to roaring lions for the faith.

The only way to dismantle Christianity is to disprove this historical fact and this has never been done, and cannot be done--it would raise more issues and questions than it solved--there's no legitimate evidence against it; only a preconceived notion that it's untrue brings doubt.

Note that the burden of proof falls on the party making the challenge that a document is not authentic or bogus:  Every document apparently ancient, coming from the proper repository or custody, and bearing on its face no evident marks of forgery, the law presumes to be genuine and devolves on the opposing party the burden of proving it to be otherwise"  (Professor, an expert on law and evidence, Simon Greenleaf of Harvard).  He also states:  "[That] the competence of the New Testament documents would be established in a  court of law." 

All the above are compelling, circumstantial evidence, and this kind of evidence is admissible in a court of law; however, no evidence can be conclusive in itself, but one must weigh it and go with the preponderance of the evidence--all the popular theories about how Christ didn't rise from the dead have been refuted and aren't believed seriously anymore by scholars (like that the disciples merely stole the body, and no one should believe the testimony of guards while they were asleep--this is not admissible evidence, and this tale circulated and the Jews believed it).  What is so compelling about the evidence and makes the gospel writers so credible?  They were willing to die for it and were in a position to know whether it was true--unlike radical Muslims dying for what they think is true--and people will gladly die for what they believe, but not for a known lie.

Finally, the integrity of the Scriptures is well-established and its reliability, authenticity, and faithful reproduction with utmost fidelity leaves no doubt that they have survived without being corrupted, as Islam claims.  Soli Deo Gloria!