flatsort discussions

What I’d like to do here is describe how people from different religions are able to help each other study (without arguing all the time).

Religion is the place where our deepest hopes and fears are located. For many people, it’s a way of life that we depend on to guide and protect our families and friends. In general, we’re just trying to do our best to hear God and do what He says. So it’s quite challenging when we encounter people who hear a different version of God speaking than what we’re used to. Fear, mistrust, and anger are understandably nearby in these situations because our deepest hopes and dreams for ourselves and our families are at risk.

Nevertheless, some of us are just crazy enough to take the risk of discussing religion. The big question is, how to do this without offending or frightening our friends? One way which I’ve found to be very affective goes like this. We don’t try to prove that God has acted in the world. Instead, we ask questions about the conditions that were present when He acted.

For example, there’s a very important story in the Bible where the Israelites are fleeing from the Egyptian army. When they come to the Red Sea, they’re trapped. They have two choices – drown in the sea or be killed or captured by the Egyptians. However, God intervenes and sends a great wind to split the sea and the  Israelites walk through it on dry ground. If you were to visit the place today, all you would find is sand and water.

When we discuss the event, we don’t try to prove or disprove the miracle. We ask questions like, what was life like as a slave in Egypt? How was Egyptian society structured, and what part did Israelites play in it? What did the economy of Egypt consist of? What was the size of the Egyptian army and how fast could it mobilize? These questions don’t always have answers. Not all of the information that we’d like to know has survived. But by asking questions, we gain a deeper perspective on the events. And, what’s extremely useful is that people from different religious traditions often have questions that we’d never think to ask on our own.

So in the next several posts I’m going to tackle the question, why do Christians think Jesus is God? But I’m not going to try and prove that Jesus is God. I’m going to describe several of the situations that made it possible for people to think that two thousand years ago. What in the world were they thinking???