The Text:
1Pe 3:15 but in your hearts be consecrated to Christ as Lord, and always be ready to make your defense to anyone who asks a reason for the hope you have. But you must do it in gentleness and reverence, (Williams NT)
My Comment:
All of us need to learn to be better witnesses to our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. These days we do not need to become missionaries overseas. Many people either overseas or who come from overseas are within our circle of influence. I have found many opportunities on the Internet to share what the Bible teaches to people of other faiths from all over the world.
I share the following interchange I have lately had with a former Christian who is now a Muslim if I correctly understand his testimony.
The challenge:
I have a liitle challenge to any learned christian here.
Prove me that i am wrong.
Once we put a vital argument that Jesus never claim as God unequivocally,and all his followers knew it very well.Most deluded claim christian apologist will refute it according to Paul, the murderer and false apostle.
Using bogus books
Romans
Ephisians
Hebrew
Chorintians etc.
Is that Jesus words and teaching or Pauls ministry and the deceiver?
Compare it here.
John 4:19, 25-26 (KJV) The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.
The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.
Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he.
My Response:
Since Messianic Bible prophecy in the Old Testament predicts and declares the deity of the Messiah in passages our Lord Jesus Christ Himself quoted as found in the record contained in the four Gospels, it is not necessary to depend on the writings of Paul to establish the doctrine of the Deity of Christ.
Opening Post (OP) Author Response to Me:
let us accept the fact even all four gospels had many self contradictory. Pertaining to the so called divinity. Just try to notice most of the words coming from Jesus is more vital to oppose it. Yes outside of it Paul elevated him into something, Aside the most developed in the book of john that can never be find in 3 synoptic gospels. And mostly from the OT the jews never had such knowledge that the messia or christ is pertaining to God, unless to a jews who converted in christianity.
My Reply:
You are correct when you assert:
“And mostly from the OT the jews never had such knowledge that the messia or christ is pertaining to God …”
Isaiah in a passage quoted by our Lord Jesus Christ supplies a clue as to why this was so:
Isa 6:9 And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
Isa 6:10 Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.
God has been very careful to respect the freedom of the will of every person. He does not force us to believe the truth by providing overwhelmingly irrefutable or undeniable evidence such that it would be impossible for anyone to not believe what He has revealed in nature (Psalm 19:1-6) or in His written word (Psalm 19:7-14) in the Bible.
Only those who have an open mind and heart to truth are able to receive the abundant truth He has provided in His written word, the Bible.
Those who do not have an open mind and heart are unwilling to receive the truth of God’s Word but instead resist, deny, contradict, and even attempt to suppress the truth.
The synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) are just as clear and forthright in their witness to the Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ as is the Gospel of John if you read them carefully.
OP Author Gives His Testimony of How He as a Christian Became a Muslim:
that is the common excuses of every christian,and far more worst to accuse us we dont have spirit to understand everything which no one can understand the mystery but those who have the spirit.But to tell you honestly sir.
No any christian can say that we dont ask the spirit every time we pray and read the bible.Let me give you my self as an example.
We all knew that all of us were born as a Roman Catholic and influence by the church. But when the missionary conquer us we are more become active in the scripture. We tend to be more develop to be literate reading the bible .When i became a born again christian we knew for the fact how the church is being corrupted.
that is why we become more guided in scripture to understand. And yes all claim christian are relying more on that spirit.
I FOUGHT FOR hard to defend the christian taeching,even when id worked in Saudi i secretly preach the bible. That is how i risk my life in the name of bible and Jesus.
But we knew for the fact we have many question at back of our mind, Somethings that the message of Jesus are so few and it always incomplete and will follow by the narration of almost 3rd persons. Which is contardictory to the words of Jesus.
Like the common criticism when Jesus uttered my God My God why you have forsaken me?? That is one of the many questionable remarks of Jesus. And even my family sometimes ask me things .They thought Jesus is God why he called for another God??
Same the famous tiktok of a young child when he reading that Jesus as when he grow God nourished him with knowledege???
See even a young and pure mind do understand things.Which an adult will always denied as he already doctrinated or manipulated.That is why it is difficult to argue when a person are more theological than academic which logic is always at hand.
Ma sha allah! With out Islam the world has no any option to see the truth but just to stay in christian world with endless contradiction about historical Jesus.
It is happened even the time of Jesus ministry. That is why there are tons of theological view about Jesus.
Name it you will find it.
You have the claim monotheistic belief, dualism, trinitarianism, modalism, etch. It defend who is majority and in power he will become the claim orthodox. But it will not die in our generation. Even some of hereticals view are being murdered and outnumber. Still they are coming back and representing as different denonination. That is why Ma sha allah.I am proud to be a Muslim. Jesus still lives in me as my great prophet the messiah who submitted to God of Abraham as we believe as a muslim. That is a very safe side as we can still see in many biblical verse a very strong argument that no one can deny. Oh by the why why i explain my past life as a christian?
Just to prove if you are right and Jesus is God, He betrayed me. When i follow him sincerely when i was taught by the church. I never commited such sinfull way when i am a christian. Dont say because i am weak. remember our christian song. Let the weak say i am strong.
My Response:
Thank you for sharing some of your spiritual history.
You raise some interesting and very important questions in your comment.
For example, you mention that even a young child wondered about “when he reading that Jesus as when he grow God nourished him with knowledege???”
That question may be related to what is said in Luke 2:52,
Luke 2:52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.
This passage teaches us that Jesus was truly human, and increased in knowledge and maturity with His increasing age just like the rest of us do.
The writer of the book of Hebrews references this fact about our Lord Jesus Christ when he wrote:
Heb 4:14 Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.
Heb 4:15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
Heb 4:16 Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.
The question about the words on the cross that Jesus spoke, a quotation from Psalm 22:1,
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?”
as recorded in Matthew 27:46,
Mat 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
I have carefully explained in my notes for Matthew 27:46 in my digital reference work, The Ultimate Cross Reference Treasury.
I have posted that information on my Real Bible Study site at the following link:
https://www.realbiblestudy.com/?p=2433
Author’s Reply to Me:
Yes sir, but still we are very clear how the trinitarian defending it. When we ask them if Jesus the man died, is God died too? And of course every trinitarian will say no! his body died but his divinity of being God will never and did not die. That is why the kid is right: if he is truly God in flesh why he should be nourished by other God? That is why trinitarian is a paradox argument. It will never stand. But to accept just a believer.
My Reply:
As for the question about “if Jesus the man died, did God die too?” one of several valid explanations would be that the Bible teaches that bodies may and do die but souls or spirits never die.
False cults and mistaken religions refuse to accept the fact that the Bible reveals to careful readers by the Rule of Necessary Inference that our Lord Jesus Christ possessed two natures in His one Person: a divine nature and a human nature.
Understanding this FACT about the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ clarifies our understanding about Who our Lord Jesus Christ is and what He has accomplished for those who believe by His death on the cross for us.
Author’s Reply to Me:
it is just plain notion that will never ever be the truth when we will ask Jesus and all his followers. People that time knew him very well and who and what is God that very distorted when we are going to ask christian..
Here a very simple with no mystery.
God is. A spirit and not a man like Jesus.
John 4:24 (KJV) God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
Aside from the very own chapter and story.
JESUS AFFIRMED WHO HE IS.
BASE FROM THE UNDERSTANDING OF A WOMAN, AS IT IS BEING PROPHECIES SINCE FROM THEIR FOREFATHER.
John 4:19, 25-26 (KJV) The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.
The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.
Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he.
As simple as that no such mystery no hokus pokus…sorry all your notion is false and our argument wil stay firm as long as we follow Jesus own words.
My Reply:
Did you notice in the very text of New Testament Holy Scripture that when the woman at the well spoke of her faith in a coming Messiah that Jesus told her, as you correctly quoted, “I that speak unto thee am he.”
The Hebrew Scriptures, our Old Testament, teach the Deity of the Messiah.
Peter makes this clear by what he writes when he states:
Pe 2:1 Stop being hateful! Quit trying to fool people, and start being sincere. Don’t be jealous or say cruel things about others.
1Pe 2:2 Be like newborn babies who are thirsty for the pure spiritual milk that will help you grow and be saved.
1Pe 2:3 You have already found out how good the Lord really is.
1Pe 2:4 Come to Jesus Christ. He is the living stone that people have rejected, but which God has chosen and highly honored.
1Pe 2:5 And now you are living stones that are being used to build a spiritual house. You are also a group of holy priests, and with the help of Jesus Christ you will offer sacrifices that please God.
1Pe 2:6 It is just as God says in the Scriptures, “Look! I am placing in Zion a choice and precious cornerstone. No one who has faith in that one will be disappointed.” (CEV, Contemporary English Version)
Notice especially what is stated in 1 Peter 2:3,
1Pe 2:3 If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. (KJV)
This verse (1 Peter 2:3) is a quotation from Psalm 34:8,
Psalm 34:8 Oh taste and see that Jehovah is good: Blessed is the man that taketh refuge in him.
American Standard Version
Notice very carefully that Peter applies what was said of Jehovah in the Old Testament to Jesus.
I have found 19 examples where the New Testament writers have applied to Jesus what was written in the Old Testament about Jehovah.
This is also seen in the narrative found in Acts 11:20, 21,
Act 11:20 And some of them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which, when they were come to Antioch, spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus.
Act 11:21 And the hand of the Lord was with them: and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord. (KJV)
Notice that in Acts 11:21 Luke uses the Old Testament phrase, “the hand of the Lord” (see Exodus 9:3). “It was proof of God’s approval of their course in preaching the Lord Jesus to Greeks (A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures, vol. 3, p. 157).”
When Luke writes at the end of Acts 11:21 that a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord,” “”Lord” refers to “the Lord Jesus,” as in verse 20 (Act 11:20), though “the hand of the Lord” is the hand of Jehovah, clearly showing that the early disciples put Jesus on a par with Jehovah. His deity was not a late development read back into the early history (A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures, vol. 3, p. 157).”
OP Author Reply to Me:
sir it is not the proper way to study scripture.First the author of John is not peter.The story of Peter doesn know how christ met the woman.
My Reply to OP Author:
I am sorry that you did not understand what I wrote in my comment.
I would kindly ask that you try to read it again.
I said nothing about the author of John being Peter.
When you write that “the story of Peter doesn’t know how Christ met the woman,” you may also be misunderstanding what John wrote in the fourth chapter of the Gospel of John.
As for what is the proper way to study Scripture, I may have far more experience than you may have about how to study the Scripture. I am most happy to encourage and help you understand more about how to do real Bible study.