Quote of the Week

We are the Bibles the world is reading; We are the creeds the world is needing; We are the sermons the world is heeding. --Billy Graham

I am a very curious person, always looking to learn something new, or research the answer to a question I have. I blame this on my mother, who spent my entire childhood keeping me busy with contant questions like "Why do you think the ants choose to live in the ground?" "How to you think a water tower works?" "Why does yeast make bread rise?" Then we would treck off to the library to find answers.

One thing I have found that is truly sad, though, is the lack of research and seeking that many do in religion. They usually just settle on something that feels good, or on what they were raised believing. While I do believe in the importance of raising children with a religious identity, I think it is MOST important that children are taught why Jesus is the way the truth and the light.

I think that many parents are intimidated with the idea of teaching "why" to their children when it comes to their faith because they don't really 100% know the answers themselves. It is a cop-out to say that Christianity is a blind religion relying only on faith. Believe me, there is a lot of faith going on, but there is also a lot of hard, concrete fact. It is important to know why you believe what you do, and why the other religions out there are not the truth.

I had the opportunity to do this while in college. Unfortunately, I had fallen away from my faith, but mostly I just wanted to know the truth, whatever it was. But in typical "me" fashion, I didn't do what many others do in my situation and just claim "I don't know, so there must be no concrete answers out there". I researched, and read, and prayed (I knew there was a God!), and talked to others, and read books recommended by pastors and non-religious people alike. The good news is, God lead me through all of that and I came out with a true conviction that Christianity is the truth and it does make sense.

The above quote claims that the world is watching us. Many people who are lost will not do what I did. They will never pick up a Bible and read it to see what is inside, but they will watch you and me. They will look for Jesus in our lives and minds. So the big question is: How good of a Bible are you? How convicted are you? Do you know why you believe?

In addition to crazy amounts of prayer and reading your Bible daily, I can recommend a few books that helped me in my journey to learning "why":

How Good is Good Enough? By Andy Stanley

This simple little book is less than 100 pages and only takes about 2 hours to read. It is the book that brought my super-logical, engineer-minded husband to an understanding of Christ. I have several of them in my home, and I give them to people who come to visit us. It is perfect treatise for the basic foundational truths of Christianity.

The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict

This book was recommended to me by my mom. It is the book that her and my dad read that ended up bringing them out of Catholicism and into Protestantism. It is a great book for discovering the answers to tough questions, like the authenticity of the Bible and the Gospel

Jesus and Muhammad

Did you know that the world's fastest growing religion is Islam? We see thousands of young Christians flocking to this religion every year. This book, written by a former Muslim, about the profound differences found between Jesus and Muhammad (it is essentially a book proving Christianity against Islam), is essential for EVERY Christian to read. We must know how to witness to the world's 2 Billion Muslims (and counting) and to our own young Christians who are intrigued by the attractive simplicity of Islam.

I also recommend any books by Francis Schaeffer. His books are very deep and take a while to get through, but they strike at the root of Christian faith.