By Lee Strobel. (the same author as a Case for Christ)

The Case Against Faith, a rebuttal

Talks about Billy Graham and his early preaching partner Charles Templeton. Templeton had many philosophical and psychological doubts about the Bible, revolving around “can we trust the Bible”? Graham had an emotional/religious experience resulting in taking the Bible by faith to be God's inspired Word, whereas Templeton found that his faith was chased away by reason and started down the path of agnosticism ever since.

• Templeton became a Christian because of a “washing over” feeling that resulted after praying/asking for washing and a new, good life after attending yet another sleazy strip joint when he was 18 as an athiest.
  • Similar to me! And yet he still becomes an agnostic later

“The last thing I want is a naive faith built on a paper-thin foundation of wishful thinking or make-believe. I need a faith that's consistent with reason, not contradictory to it; I want beliefs that are grounded in reality, not detached from it. I need to find out once and for all whether the Christian faith can stand up to scrutiny. It was time for me to talk face-to-face with Charles Templeton.”

• <regarding Israelites slaughtering the Amalekites>. They were not nice people….they were utterly and totally depraved. Their mission was to destroy Israel…God could have dealt with them through a natural disaster like a flood, but instead he used Israel as his instrument of judgement.
  • WHICH IS SUPER DANGEROUS. Why didn't God send a flood like he did with the Egyptians? Then there's no way for “God's calling” to be mistaken!

• A skeptic once said to me, “I don't believe in the Bible because it has miracles, … like turning water into wine.” It happens all the time! Rain goes into a grapevine, grows the grape, and the grape turns into wine! All Jesus did was speed it up a little bit.
• You'll find that Dixon, Nostradamus <skeptics with 6% success rate> … commonly deal with occult practices –she used a crystal ball, for example–and that could account for some of what they predicted.
  • HUH WHAA? So there are other supernatural powers? * <Why doesn't God make himself really obvious?>pg 141: On the contrary, the evidence is there if people will be willing to see it. It's not for a lack of evidence that people turn from God; it's from their pride or their will. God is not going to force anyone into the fold. Love never works coercively. It only works persuasively. And there's plenty of persuasive evidence there. * Hmm…interesting Why has God blessed me so much and seems to put Dorothy under so much hardship?! Metaphysical Musings