Jennifer by Dee Henderson

Author:Dee Henderson [Dee Henderson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781441261533
Google: HWJWPibu4l8C
Amazon: B00B85M0GS
Barnesnoble: B00B85M0GS
Goodreads: 17720964
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2013-03-05T13:00:00+00:00

6

Thanks for talking about this and not pushing. I like going to church with you. I just don’t understand much of this yet.” Jennifer shifted the books she carried as she and Tom walked along a park path where they had retreated from the Sunday-evening crowds. It was important to him, church, and she was trying her best to understand why.

She’d read the book of Luke as a favor to him, and read other parts of the Bible in smaller sections, but it was hard to make sense of all the information that flowed at her—about God, about Israel’s history, about Jesus, about the church.

“What else can I answer for you?”

“How do you know, Tom? That the Bible, that Christianity, is true?”

“I wish I had a brilliant answer for you. I guess, as with most things, you start with common sense.” Tom walked a bit, then bent to pick up a small branch on the path. He snapped the wood in two pieces and held them up.

“The Bible tells about how people would take a piece of wood, use part of it to start a fire, and use the other part to carve out an image of a god, then worship that image and pray to it for rain and good fortune. As if the works of their own hands could come alive and answer them. It’s illogical and foolish. So common sense will knock down most religions.” He tossed aside the sticks.

“Other religions sound good on the surface, but turn out to be impersonal systems based on grading what you do to determine your worth. Christianity is the only religion that promises not a system but a personal God you have a relationship with. At its core, Christianity is a relationship with a God who is listening, responding, and interacting with those who love Him. That’s how you prove it, Jen. You test Christianity’s claims by testing out the relationship on which it’s built.”

“Can you have a relationship with God if you don’t believe in Him?” she asked. “That doesn’t seem possible. Isn’t Christianity something you have to take on faith first? Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus died for people’s sins. Jesus rose from the dead. Those are hard facts to absorb and believe.”

Tom weighed her question, then nodded. “Consider it this way. If you step off a tall building, it’s immaterial whether you think gravity is true or not; it’s still going to splat you on the ground a few seconds later. Right?”

“Thanks for that image.”

He smiled. “It got the point across. In some ways it doesn’t matter what you believe. Christianity is more like that gravity analogy than not. God is God right now, and He will still be God tomorrow, regardless of whether you choose to believe in Him today or not. That’s a good thing. It means you can ask questions and search out answers and see for yourself what is true. God will still go on being God while you ponder the questions.

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