Jesus

It’s been popular in the past ten years (or so) to describe Jesus as nothing more than a “retelling” of prior “dying and rising” gods such as Horus or Osiris. Skeptics who make such claims typically describe a number of shared characteristics in an effort to highlight the similarities between …

Of the many non-Christian explanations for the Resurrection, the “Swoon Theory” is amongst the most popular. If Jesus didn’t really die on the cross, His alleged “resurrection” is really nothing more than a remarkable “resuscitation”. Those who doubt Jesus’ death often point to the short amount of time Jesus spent …

I was a skeptical thirty-five-year-old atheist when I first read through the New Testament. I was also a detective serving in Los Angeles County. I can still remember where I was when I discovered this verse: “…if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also …

As Christmas gift exchanges approach, the gift of Jesus is easily obscured. But gifted prophets predicted the birth of the Messiah, and these prophesies, like other Old Testament prophecies, testify to the Divine nature of the Bible. The New Testament contains two different types of prophetic declarations: the prophecies uttered …

As we approach Christmas in just a few days, I’ve been thinking about what separates Jesus from other great religious figures of history. Many faith traditions lay claim to famous religious leaders and founders, but Jesus is different. Jesus claimed to be more than a good teacher or leader. Jesus …

For some, the miraculous claim of the virgin conception of Jesus disqualifies the Gospel accounts as reliable history. The famous writer, atheist and debater, Christopher Hitchens regularly referred to the virgin conception as a clear example of the unreasonable nature of the Gospels. Hitchens would occasionally attempt to demonstrate the …

We’ve been looking at the virgin conception of Jesus recently, and in this post, I’d like to address an objection leveled at the writings of Paul. Many critics have argued that Paul was either completely silent about the virgin conception or spoke directly against such a concept in his writings. …

I thought I would complete this week’s series of Christmas blogs by addressing three common objections to the virgin conception of Jesus. I’ll start with the objection that the virgin conception was borrowed from prior pagan mythologies such as those of Mithras or Horus. Skeptics have properly observed that many …

I’ve been writing lately about the “virgin conception” of Jesus. Is this an essential truth claim of Christianity? Is it reasonable Jesus could have been conceived in such a miraculous way? Was the “virgin conception” borrowed from mythologies that preceded Jesus? If the “Virgin conception” is true, why didn’t Paul …

Some critics have argued the “virgin conception” of Jesus is a late mythological addition attributed to Christian believers many centuries after the fact. These skeptics presume, of course, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were written far later than the 1st Century, when eyewitnesses would have been available to refute …